


Tear it all Down

by captainangua



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Bi!Dean, Child Abuse, Complete AU, Detective!Cas, Ex-Con!Dean, F/F, F/M, Falling In Love, Genderswap, Happy Ending, M/M, PI!Cas, Pedophilia, Protective Dean, Undercover, Weechesters, genderswap!dean
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-02-27
Updated: 2014-04-11
Packaged: 2018-01-13 22:09:51
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 8
Words: 34,588
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1242415
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/captainangua/pseuds/captainangua
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Castiel is a private detective, whose biggest current problem is the constant teasing he gets from his partner Anna for trying to look like Columbo. But when he's recruited by Michael and Naomi, the wealthy power-couple at the head of the Devas weapons facility to track down the long-missing family scions, he's forced to infiltrate an anarchist group dedicated to bringing down the company he's just been hired by, and suddenly life becomes a lot more complicated.<br/>He soon finds that the wayward Winchester siblings have no intention of hearing out their uncle's proposal - Cas is going to have to go deep undercover if he hopes to win the trust of the eldest Winchester, the impossibly gorgeous Deanna.<br/>But Deanna has a lifetime of reasons to hate the Devases, and isn't about to be an easy sell.<br/>Can this routine-loving ex-cop find some common ground with this dangerous ex-con?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Wayward Son, Wayward Daughter

**Author's Note:**

> I've been wanting to try a genderbent!Dean fic for a while now... this is probably going to be pretty long, there's a whole bunch of ideas floating around for it.  
> Enjoy!  
> (Also, ANY feedback at all WILL make my face light up for the rest of the day. Just hinting. Hi.)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prologue - Deanna Winchester is twelve, and Lucifer ruins her life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First chapter is tiny - it's only a baby prologue. Also it was 1am and I was supposed to be finishing an essay. Oops.  
> Minor warning for child abuse/pedophilia

Deanna Winchester hadn’t always been a light sleeper. She was sure of that. She remembered, fuzzily now, being a small child and having her long sandy hair stroked by her mother in front of the television, and waking up in her bed in the morning, alone. The memories were getting more blurred day by day now, and Deanna hated it – she was twelve years old, it was only eight years since her mother’s accident, and yet if she didn’t have the picture of them both together, laughing, she doubted she would even remember what Mary had looked like.

But times changed, parents died, and now, left to care for a wimpy brother who still got night terrors, her eyes would flick open at the slightest of noises.

This time it was because she could hear voices. No one should be speaking at – she checked her watch, which she’d apparently gone to sleep in – two in the morning. Not with Sammy asleep in the next room.

Trying to keep quiet, she slipped both of her legs out of her bed, and into her faded green slippers, and concentrated on not bumping into anything in the dark. She was going through a bit of a clumsy phase – her dad, in his rare moments of soft-spoken sobriety, had said she was ‘growing into herself’. She wasn’t certain how happy she was about that, there wasn’t much she was turning into that she was pleased with. She still felt painfully flat-chested, and she was all hard angles with no redeeming dimples or curves as of yet. She had hoped that her freckles would have started to fade, but they had only spread, so that it looked in some lights as though she’d caught some sort of horrible disease. She liked her eyes though, but they weren’t new, and just now they looked so strangely disproportional amongst her small, chiselled features, that Sammy said they made her look a little like an alien cat.

Yeah, Sammy was growing up into quite the little bitch. She was almost glad John Winchester wasn’t around to see that – he’d never liked a smart-mouth on a child.

As she shuffled her way out into the hallway, she paused and glanced quickly in both directions. She heard the voice again, talking quietly… it was definitely coming from Sam’s room. Deanna closed her eyes tight shut for a moment, and bit her lip as she balled her hands into small fists. But that was definitely His voice. _Lucifer._

_Lucifer was in her brother’s room, at two in the morning._

Well. That wasn’t his real name. He’d told them to call him Uncle Lucius when he’d arrived to take them home with him, but Deanna hadn’t liked the way he leered at them, or the way he talked down to her like a _child_. And then he’d claimed the cat had ran off. But she’d seen him bring home that rat poison and she knew for a fact they did _not_ have rats, not with Spock the Vul-cat around.

But she’d be damned if she was telling Sammy about that.

No longer wanting to be quiet, but only to make herself brave, as brave as her mother, Captain Mary Winchester, Deanna stomped across the hall to her brother’s room and slammed the door wide open.

She’d hoped, she’d _prayed,_ (and Deanna didn’t, on principle, pray) that this stranger-brother of her Dad’s was somehow going to turn out… a good guy. That she’d sussed him wrong, that in years to come he could be the parent she’d been missing ever since her mother’s death, that they’d all laugh about that stupid nickname she’d given him…

But there he was, sitting on Sammy’s bed, with a look of such intense pleasure it almost looked like pain, watching this _eight year old boy_ pull down his underwear for him.

Sam had whipped his head around as soon as she’d walked through the door. He was shaking, slightly, and he looked so hopeful and so ashamed, Deanna thought her heart might just break out of her ribcage. “Deanna?” His voice sounded so _small._

She breathed in, aware of Lucifer looking at her, his face now blank. “Pull your pants back up Sammy,” she said, her voice steady, though not as low as she’d hoped. It sounded almost… squeaky. Very much the twelve year old girl, and not the bold police officer.

Sammy wriggled back into his clothes, and tentatively ran over to stand beside her. Deanna took his hand, wishing she was taller, that she was stronger, that she knew what she was doing. That she wasn’t in her pyjamas and slippers.

“Sammy’s going to sleep in _my_ bed tonight,” she said, fighting valiantly to keep her voice from quivering. “You sick, sick pervert. And then I’m going to call my Uncle Bobby and he’s going to send your ass to jail.”

She waited for any kind of response. After what felt like a week, Lucifer smiled, vaguely, as though she’d just tried talking to him about something girly and sweet and ridiculous. When he spoke he kept his voice happy enough, but now she could hear the menace in it, just as she’d been able to see it in his eyes when he’d asked her if she’d seen the cat.

“Deanna, sweetheart, I don’t remember telling you to get out of bed.”

Gripping Sam’s hand tightly, she stuck out her chin and tried to sneer at him. “You’re not the boss of me.”

Smile widening a little, he cocked his head to one side. “Aren’t I?” He sighed and stood up. Deanna wanted to move, but for that moment she was too petrified to even move a muscle.

…And suddenly he had grabbed both her skinny arms, her hand was pulled from her brother’s and Lucifer had her backed up against the wall of the hallway. She was panting and screaming and kicking and Sammy was yelling and punching at his legs – tyke would never lift a finger for himself, but for his _sister_ he would tackle every monster – but Lucifer’s grip was strong. It was the one thing she’d noticed that he had that resembled her father – the large, powerful hands.

“Are you still, so very sure about that Deanna?” His voice was soft, and so very, very _assured._

“Let me just remind you of your circumstances here. I? I am a wealthy, adult male from the most powerful family in the city, who has taken pity on his poor, sad, dead, half-brother’s children. If said children become delusional… then maybe I could find them a therapist. Or perhaps a military school.”

Gathering up all her courage, Deanna spat in his face. Again, he sighed, as though he were disappointed with her efforts. Then he pushed her harder up against the wall, her feet were risen off the ground now.

“Now, now Deanna. I _am_ going to get what I want. The only question is how much I’ll have to hurt you before that can happen.” His eyes seemed to soften, but remained cold and detached. “You have such a pretty face, you're your mother’s image. It would be a shame to ruin it.”

“Please,” begged Deanna, breaking now. “Just take me, leave Sammy alone.”

Sam looked up at her in alarm, tears streaming down his face. “No!”

“Please, just, just leave Sammy.”

She watched his jaw harden, watched her last, desperate hope die, and her lip curled in renewed rage. “So am I too _old_ for you? Or am I too _female?_ ” She narrowed her eyes and sneered, keeping an eye on Sammy walking nearer Lucifer’s crotch, while making a face at her. “You fucking faggoty pedophile.”

She knew that this time he was really going to hurt her.

“Now, Sam!”

Lucifer yelled as the small boy beneath his legs punched up with all his eight-year old might, and Deanna was able to break free of his grip. “Run Sammy, follow me!”

She knew where she was going – in her frenzied mind as she raced downstairs, Sam at her heels, it seemed the only place left to run to. She could hear Lucifer start to follow them once they reached the main entrance room. Good. She wanted him to, now.

The door to the cellar was stiff though and for a moment she was scared she wouldn’t get it open in time, and Sam was looking up at her like she was insane, but wasn’t going to try arguing with her. Eventually, the old wooden door swung open, just as Lucifer came up thundering behind.

“Lock the door, Sam!” Deanna yelled as she flicked the light-switch and ran down the wooden steps, trying desperately not to trip, and bounded down in front of the suitcases and boxes that she knew would be waiting for her.

“Deanna he’s at the door!” Sam called from the top of the stairs.

“Hold on there, buddy!” Raking around in the open suitcase, Deanna found what she was looking for. And, hardening herself, she marched back halfway up the stairs with it in hand, keeping it behind her back. But Sam had seen. “Deanna…” he moaned slightly, worried questions laced through his voice.

“Open the door, Sam,” she said coolly.

His face crumpled. “Deanna, no.” The thumping started at the door again. “Deanna I’m not... I'm not worth it, please don’t.”

“Sammy,” Deanna said, trying to give him a smile. “You are the most important thing in the whole world, ok?”

He pouted unhappily, his eyebrows raised suspiciously under his mop of brown fringe.

“Just… just open the door again. I promise I will make this alright. Ok?”

Sam bit his lip. “Ok,” he whispered, and turned to put the key back in the lock.

Lucifer thumped once more on the door before he almost fell through the doorway, as Deanna watched her brother hide behind the door. But luckily Lucifer’s attention, as she’d hoped, was all  on her.

He took a few deep and satisfied breaths in. “Now Deanna. Are you going to be sensible about this now?”

Deanna nodded. “Yes,” she said, and pulled out her daddy’s old shotgun from behind her back. Then she fired at his chest, both hands on the trigger. She noticed, quite vividly, almost as though she weren’t really there, two things. The wide eyed, open-mouthed look on Lucifer’s face. And Sammy scrunching up his little face, his fingers in his ears.

Smart kid.

*

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I took the name 'Devas', as its something referred to in many religions and cultures as something with similar status to an Angel. Also, just because it's a cool word. Devas. DEvas. deVAS. DEEEEvas. Hmm. If anyone actually knows of the correct pronunciation, please let me know :)  
> Lucifer, I know, doesn't exactly fit the most traditional character of a pedophile, but I had to smoosh it up with his character...


	2. Not so hard to find

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When Castiel gets hired to track down where the Winchesters are now, it leads him back to his old mentor, Bobby Singer, and a rather embarassing first meeting with the eldest Winchester.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to everyone who left comments and Kudos - here's the actual fic being started now :)

Castiel knew that he didn’t get out enough into his own city anymore – he had Anna to remind him of this every day – but he was still surprised that he had managed to forget the best bus stop to get off for the centre of town, and the Devas building. He’d missed it by several stops, actually, and was now in danger of being late. Hell, everyone knew where the big ugly skyscraper was – the tallest to take up the skyline, and almost painful to look at on sunny days like this, when the light bounced off the thousand silver windows, which covered the entire face of it. He knew, at heart, he would always be a traditionalist, and therefore naturally biased against such a modern eyesore, but his inner teenage wannabe architect was screaming just as loudly at the sight of the ridiculous structure.

Checking the busy road hurriedly as he ran across, his trench coat billowing out behind him in the breeze, Castiel arrived at the automated spinning doors and had to repress a sigh. He really hated these doors. The positives of working from a dingy old flat: never having doors that actively tried to hit back. Steeling himself, and trying not to screw up his face too much, he shuffled through the door into the lobby. He checked his watch. _Just_ on time. He frowned. Unless Naomi had changed in the years since he’d last seen her, she would not appreciate that.

Conscious of the loud echoes his footsteps made on the polished marble floor, and feeling more than a little out of place in his old suit and over-worn coat, he marched up the lobby to the reception desk. There was only one man there at the computer, and he hadn’t seemed to have noticed Cas yet. Messy brown curls were facing up as he continued to scribble away at his piece of paper. After another few moments of awkwardly standing there, Cas cleared his throat.

“One moment please,” the man said as he carried on writing, making it very difficult for Cas not to scowl. Finally, he looked up. “Can I help you?”

“Yes, I’m here to see Naomi Devas.”

“You’re here to see _Mrs Devas?_ ” The man – Chuck, Cas now noticed from his nametag – snorted. “Well, I am very sorry but I don’t think she’s even in today, she barely every uses these offices except-”

He clicked something else on the computer which made his mouth form a perfect round O. “Ah. You do have an appointment.” He smiled nervously up at Cas. “Castiel DiAngelo?”

“Yes, that’s me.”

“Oh,” Chuck grinned nervously, his demeanour entirely transformed. “Right.” He gave him the directions to the office and sent him on his way to the elevator very eagerly after that.

Alone in an elevator heading all the way up to the top floor, Cas tried to remember the last time he had met Naomi. A cousin on his mother’s side, she was some ten, fifteen years older than him and they had never been close. But then, Cas’ family hadn’t exactly been the type for warmth, for closeness. And after he’d demoted himself out of the police force, the extended family had faded into the background even more than usual. But now Naomi wanted to see him. Wanted to _hire_ him.

The last time they’d met… it had to have been at his father’s funeral. She wasn’t long married, and she’d been forced to leave the service early to calm down her crying child – Adam, Cas remembered. He hadn’t ever met the boy. Vaguely, he wondered if he would see him today, or if things would be kept strictly to business. It all depended, he supposed, on what kind of job it was that she had called him for. Since most of his income tended to depend on discovering cheating spouses, or looking into the college habits of scrounging teenagers, it may be that Naomi would not want to make this a social interview. She had kept things very vague on the phone, however she had alluded that the job she was offering was connected to the company.

Surely she would not hold an interview with him in her own husband’s building if what she was asking of him was an investigation into his fidelity. In any case, Cas couldn’t imagine Michael Devas ever _sleeping around._ He’d only met the man a small handful of times, but the impression he’s got was of an uptight, God-fearing man in the most traditional sense.

But then, Cas thought, catching himself as the elevator doors pinged for him to get out, he hadn’t ever been all that good at figuring people out. That was one of the reasons he still found his job interesting, exciting, and not because he wanted to be Lieutenant Columbo. People, to him, were a puzzle, and one day he would like to understand them better, what made them work.

He was standing in another reception area: there were two grey leather couches, but there seemed to be no one around to greet him. The next room was walled with glass, and he could see that Naomi was in there – looking a little older perhaps, but not as much as he’d expected. It had, after all, been almost fifteen years since he’d seen her last, but clearly she had been taking good care of herself, as, obviously, she could afford to. She was sitting at her desk, with a heavy-set man in a blue business suit trying to talk down to her.

Cas awkwardly stopped himself from staring through the glass and went to sit down in one of the empty couches. But he could still _hear_ them.

“…I’m sorry you feel that way Zachariah, but this is my company and I _will_ proceed as I choose in this.”

“ _Your_ company?”

“A man and wife are as one in the eyes of God, Zachariah. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have my next appointment waiting outside for me.”

As Cas heard the clipping of high heels start approaching the glass door, he straightened himself up and tried quickly fixing his tie. Anna had sorted it for him just before he’d left and now, somehow, it was all off-centre again.

“Castiel!” Naomi sang, as she walked out towards him, enveloping him in a tight embrace after he jumped to his feet. She pulled off, continuing to hold onto his arms, and beamed at him. “Well! You have grown up well.”

Behind her, Cas noticed the surly man she’d been arguing with stomping off in the other direction.

“I am sorry I kept you waiting. Although I noticed that you weren’t on time either, so no harm done I assume.” She smiled, and Cas awkwardly tried to match it. So she had noticed.

“I’m afraid I… was a little confused by the public transport service today.”

She simpered. “Oh Castiel, aren’t you able to afford your own transport?”

Cas tried hard to sustain his smile. “Yes I am, however I felt this would be better environmentally.”

She smiled, as though trying to see the joke, and then laughed, and led him in to her office area.

“Oh I have missed you, cousin,” she said as Cas sat down at the desk, facing her. The angle of it made him feel a lot smaller than her, somehow.

“It has been a long time,” he agreed, finishing in his head, _long enough to contact me if you really did miss me._

“Oh and when we _heard_ about your tragedy…”

_You didn’t even send a card._

She sighed. “Oh, it must have been awful.”

He nodded, uncertain of what he could say to that. “Yes,” he answered simply. “Now, what was it you were wanting to discuss with me, Naomi?”

She smiled. “Down to business so soon? You are very much the good detective. You know that coat does make you look a little like that, that man on the TV show years ago…”

Cas breathed in heavily. “Columbo.”

“Yes! Was it a deliberate…?”

“No.”

“Ah.” She smiled again, as though satisfied with this information and leaned forward at her desk, hands clasped. “Actually, I will admit that I called you instead of hiring elsewhere, Castiel, because I did hope that our family bond would give us a… stronger position of trust. You see, this is a rather sensitive matter I am raising on my husband’s behalf today. It involves… a rather delicate issue for Michael’s family.”

“Of course, I assure complete client confidentially for all of my clients…”

“Of course. But… being who we are, and this issue being what I fear it may be, discretion really is of the upmost importance. I need you to find someone Castiel, two someones, actually. Family members of my husband.”

“Did they… lose touch?”

“It was more that they disappeared. Now… as I say this is a sensitive matter.” She sighed. “The two individuals in question were the only two children of Michael’s half-brother, John Winchester.”

Cas thought for a second. “John Winchester…”

“He was a cop, you may have heard of him. A good cop, from what I’ve heard. He left the force shortly after his wife’s death, a fire, I think, officially to care for his young children: Deanna, who was four at the time, and Sam, who was only a baby. In reality his alcoholism was getting out of hand and it cost him his job, and, eventually his life.” Her mouth curled down at the edges slightly. “Very sad, of course. The children were only twelve and eight. At this point Michael’s brother, Lucius, took on the care of them – did you ever meet Lucius?”

“No, I - I don’t think so.”

“Well. Charming man. It’s a shame… So you never heard anything of what happened?”

“I am pretty certain that I didn’t, no,” said Cas, growing slightly irritated now.

“Amazing. We tried to keep things as private as possible… however the scandal was so large that…” She broke off and scowled.

“What happened, Naomi?”

“The girl was… somewhat disturbed after her father’s death, there was something not quite right about her. In any case, one night she lost her head, and tried to blast poor Lucius’ chest open with a shotgun.

Cas’ eyebrows raised, his interest peaked now. That hadn’t been quite what he’d expected. “Did she succeed?”

Naomi eyed him strangely. “No. She was a twelve-year old girl who’d stolen her father’s shotgun. She missed the heart… just. Lucius was in a coma for a month. Michael was distraught of course. He thought he might have lost two of his younger brothers in the space of a few months.” Cas tried to imagine the hard-jawed man he’d met looking ‘distraught’, but failed to picture it.

“…By the time Lucius was awake, the girl was in a detention centre, and the boy was in foster care.”

“Did she ever explain why?”

“I told you, she was entirely disturbed, Castiel. Now, when she got out of prison, we never heard from her, and all attempts to track her down have come up with nothing. Her brother had already fallen out of touch, and the foster family he’d been staying with… well, we hadn’t tried to attempt contact with them in years, the boy never wanted to see us. But they weren’t living at the same address, and when we tracked them down recently, they claimed that they hadn’t seen Sam since he turned eighteen and left, and that they hadn’t seen Deanna at all. I suspect they were lying however.”

Cas got his notebook out. “Sorry, what was the name of the family?”

“The Harvelles.”

“So there hasn’t been any sign of either Sam or Deanna since she got out of prison.”

“No.”

“And you decided only now to track them down because…”

“Because they are Michael’s family. That is important to him.”

Cas narrowed his eyes. They were _Michael’s_ family, not Naomi’s. “Why now, after so long?”

She seemed to choose her next words carefully. “Perhaps… because Michael would like to make amends with them, and for the sake of their father perhaps involve them in the company.”

“ _Involve_ them?”

She sighed. “My husband… has a rather misplaced sense of guilt when it comes to the Winchesters, and Deanna in particular. He feels he owes them now a share in our good fortune.”

“I see.”

“So any help that you can be in rediscovering them would be appreciated, Castiel.”

“Of course.”

“And for your discretion, you will of course be rewarded handsomely.”

Cas paused, again unsure of what to say. “Thank you, Naomi.”

*

“I don’t know, Cas,” Anna sighed to him later from her desk. “It all sounds a little… creepy, doesn’t it? Lost delinquent heirs needing tracked down by the biggest weapons manufacturing company in the country…” She shuddered, making her bright red hair fall all out of place again. “Inias, don’t you think it sounds creepy?”

The boy looked up, as always, alarmed at being addressed, as he sat Cas’ coffee down at his desk. “Uhhh…” He was only twenty, and the mop of brown hair that almost reached his eyes made him look a little gormless at times.

“Leave him alone, Anna,” Cas growled as he brought up another tab on his computer on the Deanna Winchester trial. “I didn’t say it wasn’t creepy. Just that Naomi’s family, and that we need the money.”

Anna frowned. “Well, I suppose it’s nice not to be spying on another arrogant rich twat cheating on his wife this time. But I don’t get it. What do they need us for? Surely a company like the Devas’ has a lot more resources than we do for finding someone.”

“Mmm,” Cas noised, noncommittally. He wasn’t really listening to his partner anymore.

 _Although an appeal was demanded for Deanna Winchester, who pled self-defence, the Devas lawyers ensured it never returned to trial._  

There was a photo attached to the article – of a skinny child with long, dirty blonde hair, eyeing the camera with a bitter sense of humour. Cas started to wonder how she looked now, fifteen years on at twenty-seven. Would she have kept her hair long?

“Cas, you’re not listening to me.”

“…sorry?”

“I said have you tried calling Bobby Singer? I just looked it up and I was right, he was Winchester’s partner back in the force. I think he’s retired now, not sure what it is he’s doing with himself…”

Cas nodded to himself. So that was where he’d heard the name Winchester before. Bobby had trained both he and Anna, along with hundreds of other young officers. And everyone who’d ever trained under him remembered the grumpy old man with a smile, and had a fond complaint to make of him.

“I’ll look him up,” Cas said, nodding.

“Well, tomorrow you can. We’re going out tonight. Remember?”

“No.”

“Told you he’d have forgotten,” Anna said as an aside to Inias, who laughed quietly into his own coffee. She turned her unimpressed gaze back onto Cas. “Balthazar. Your oldest friend-”

“Not my oldest friend.”

“Your oldest friend that you still speak to. His birthday. It’s tonight.”

Cas lifted his coffee mug and smiled. “No it isn’t. It’s on the twenty-seventh.”

“His birthday _party_ , Cas. Which I _heard_ you promise to go to, just last week.”

“I believe I said that I would make it if I was able to.”

“You are able to.”

“This case is important.”

“And could wait till tomorrow, Cas,” Anna growled, before slumping over her desk. “C’mon Cas. Balthazar’s getting worried about you. Christ, we all are. It’s been almost three years now…”

Inias stiffened and became highly interested in the contents of his coffee mug.

“I’m aware of that, Anna.”

“I get that you’re happy with your little hermitage life…”

“Mmm.”

“…But we’re your friends, Cas! We want to see you, and to see you have fun.”

“Anna.” Cas sighed and breathed out heavily. “I appreciate your concern. I do. But I lived with Balthazar for years in college. And I’m very aware that his idea of ‘fun’ is not what I want to see in a night out.”

Anna raised her eyebrows and shrugged in vague agreement. Balthazar was turning thirty-five tonight, and still his parties could get just as wild as they ever had when he’d turned twenty-one. Then Anna slumped back into her worn leather seat. “Oh, fine. But I’m not covering for you,” she added, pointing a finger over at Cas. “So when he turns up in a few days looking to take you out somewhere, that’s not my fault, alright?”

“Thank you, Anna.”

Soon after she’d left, and Cas told Inias to go home for the night – he was a keen intern, though Cas still found it odd having one around in the first place, but Anna had insisted – Cas found out something of what Lieutenant Singer had done after retirement. Cas remembered him retiring a few years before he and Anna had also left the force, but heard nothing of anything about his life since. Apparently, he’d started a charitable movement, which had its office in town… It was involved in assisting victims and ex-soldiers of war and in protesting against arms dealers and their pervasive contemporary political influence. Companies like Devas Corp.

_Interesting._

*

Feeling refreshed after a morning at the gym, Cas worked out the best way to get over to Bobby’s ‘Arms Off!’ office in town, and this time didn’t miss his bus stop, Cas didn’t like driving all that much. He appreciated the usefulness of being able to, occasionally, but wasn’t fond of cars, or of the ugly smell they made, or the frustration of waiting in transport. Mostly, he preferred walking everywhere, but this office was just a little too far away for that.

Sometimes he missed small town living.

Having suspected that Bobby would still be keeping things as informal as ever, Cas wasn’t worried as he arrived at the tall apartment building – which apparently was all the property of Bobby’s ‘Arms Off!’ – without an appointment. He couldn’t help comparing the building to that of the DevasCorp one from the day before. This place was about ten times smaller, older, and far less structurally sound, by the look of it. And it didn’t feel like an office at all. There was a sort of dilapidated warmth to the place, conjured mainly by the moth-eaten coloured rug covering the worn wooden flooring, but this ground floor also had a washing machine going full pelt in the corner, and a bright pink bicycle leaning against the wall. As far as Cas could see up the stairs there were photos, some of Bobby, presumably including many of the people he had helped, and children’s drawings scattered everywhere. Cas was so busy looking up at them all that he hadn’t noticed the giant dog rise from the carpet and start pressing his wet nose up to his leg.

“Uh, hello,” Cas said to it, startled. The big tawny mongrel started shaking all over at that, and, apparently taking Cas’ interest as an invitation, it raised up its front paws and jumped up on Cas’ front.

“Khan, you giant nuisance!”

At the sound of the woman’s voice from the back of the hall, ‘Khan’ let off of Cas. His saviour was a red-headed woman in large purple-rimmed specs. “Now sit!”

Whining slightly, the dog slumped onto his hind legs, and the woman’s stern face broke into a grin as she leaned forward to rub its ears. “Who’s a good boy? Yes, you Khan, yes you are. And who’s more of a cat person anyway? Charlie is, yes that’s right!” As the dog wagged its tail and slumped off again, the woman wiped some stray dog hairs off of her hands, and offered one to Cas.

“Sorry about the mutt, I’m Charlie.”

Cas smiled and shook her hand. “Castiel. I was wondering if Bobby Singer was around today?”

“Bobby? Yeah he’s up there, somewhere. Probably not doing an awful lot. I’ll take you up there.”

As they climbed the stairs, Charlie explained that she’d only really started working here as an extra thing to do to help people after moving town. “…But now, well, I’ve still got my job, but to be honest I end up spending a hell of a lot more time here. And Bobby doesn’t even pay me!”

“Everyone here is entirely working for free?”

“Oh yeah. Bobby kinda spent all his savings on buying and refitting this place. And hell, it’s not like we really do anything to make a profit around here. I mean, I’ve got some pretty cool ideas, but Bobby never takes any of them seriously.” She sighed dramatically. “I could look like a serious person right?”

“Eh…”

“Right? I mean, if I wasn’t covered in Sam’s dog’s fur right now…”

_Sam?_

“Anyway. Here’s you.” They had reached the top staircase, at the last of the doors to the small appartments-come-office. This one had Bobby’s name on the door. Charlie knocked hard, twice. “Hey Bobby,” she called in, “Got someone here to see you!”

There was a grunted, “I’m coming,” from the other side of the door and a few seconds later Bobby was standing in the doorway, with a grumpy face which transformed into a look of happy shock.

“Cas DiAngelo? Is that really you?”

Cas nodded, smiling. “Lieutenant Singer,” he said, and was pulled into a fierce unexpected hug.

“It’s Bobby, y’idjit, I’m retired now.”

Cas grinned, and patted the older man’s faded plaid-clad arm, a little awkwardly. “I’ll remember.”

Bobby breathed in and pulled back, still smiling up at Cas. “So, come in, come in, son, and I’ll make us some coffee.”

Charlie perked up. “I could make the coffee.”

“Nope,” grunted Bobby, pulling Cas through the doorway.

“But I don’t wanna miss the bromance,” Charlie called out disappointedly, as the door slammed in her face.

Bobby smiled guiltily. “She’s a good girl, Charlie. But she could talk for anything and about nothing. Now c’mon, take a seat, tell me something about yourself,” he added, ushering Cas down into an old leather couch. “I heard about the accident,” he said, tone becoming more like the grave, doom-ridden voice Cas remembered. “Jesus Christ, Cas, that was what, two years ago now?”

Cas nodded stiffly, “Three this month.”

“Three years. Well Hell, if you ever need anyone to be there for you, you know I’ve gone through the same-”

“I know Bobby, thank you.”

“Well, you didn’t want to come here and do nothing but wallow with an old man. How’ve you been since? I heard you quit the force.”

“It lost something of its charm after you’d gone.”

“Ha, ha. And Anna too, though. Now she was one of my favourites. A real sharp one.”

“I left shortly after Anna.” It hadn’t been the same without his partner. “She’d got the same way as you Bobby, couldn’t bear to be inside the same corrupted system anymore.”

“What is it you’re both doing now then?”

Cas hesitated a moment. “We, eh. We started up our own detective agency, actually.”

Bobby laughed. “P.I. Milton and DiAngelo?”

“That’s right.”

“Ever on homicide anymore?”

Cas smiled. “Not very often, no. Occasionally however we do get the odd case of _suspected_ homicide. They can be… interesting.”

“I’ll bet.”

“But Bobby, it’s you with the crazy career,” Cas continued, gesturing to the room they were sat in. What you’ve done already with this place… It’s amazing.”

Bobby snorted. “I don’t know if _amazing_ is quite the right word, I don’t feel we’ve really started on all the things we want to be doing just yet. Hell, I was properly fired up, still am to be honest, about having all these new anarchist ideas working out… Mostly, I suppose it’s like you said. I’m an old cop, I can’t help seeing conspiracies everywhere. And then I realised that I was living under one. All the things that seemed to be wrong seemed to come from the top. And the top all seemed to be mired in the influence of companies like Devas Corp, same load of wealthy shits who got all the boys sent out to war because they wanted their weapons to sell. And Hell, I saw first hand the sorts of things war could do to guy. My partner John, he was gone before your time, but he was a sweet old romantic. But war had screwed with his head: then when he lost his wife, it was all he could do to stay alive as long as he did.”

“He had… children, didn’t he, John.”

Bobby looked at him strangely. “John was gone before you joined.”

“I… heard something about him.”

Bobby rolled his eyes darkly. “You mean you heard something about the Lucius Devas shooting.”

“…Yes.”

“S’alright boy, no harm in asking.” Bobby sighed, and shook his head. “Deanna was twelve. Just _twelve._ When a kid goes through something like that, they need someone to talk to, not a bunch of fancy lawyers shouting them down until the only folk they have to talk to are their cellmates.” He shook his head. “That’s part of what got me looking into the Devas lot more fully. Didn’t want bastards like that, who’d get their own family tossed into jail, having anything to do with the way this country, this city is run.” He sneered. “John always hated the lot of them, because they’d always looked down on him. He was just their father’s bastard to them, not their brother. They didn’t want him anywhere near the company money, and John was happy to leave things that way.”

Cas frowned slightly. Where then did this _misplaced guilt_ of Michael Devas’ suddenly arise from?

Bobby sighed again. “Yeah, John never did think ahead all that much. If he had he might just have been more careful about leaving those kids of his alone without him.” Bobby stared past Cas, his face seeming haunted, until he seemed to snap himself out of his reverie, and smiled. “Hey, screw coffee, eh? Let’s go find a bar, we need a proper catch-up or nothing, and we’re getting all maudlin already.”

Smiling his agreement, and deciding to ask more about the Winchesters after they’d both had some alcohol, Cas stood up from the couch and followed Bobby out the door, as the other man started to fiddle with his keys. “I wouldn’t keep this locked,” he explained through gritted teeth, “Only sometimes Ash comes up and decides to ‘update’ my computers, and suddenly none of my darn equipment works for me anymore. Ah balls,” Bobby added as he started unlocking the door he’d just locked up. “Forgot my darn wallet, didn’t I? I’ll be back out in a second.”

“I’ll just wait here then,” Cas said as the door shut in his face. Alone in the corrider, Cas again found a lot to admire on the walls above him – the ceiling’s skylight was rather impressive – and started wondering to himself about this case he had taken on. If he was right, and Bobby was still in contact with the Winchesters, then they were still in the city, they surely couldn’t have been all that difficult to find. Anna had been right. Why _did_ Naomi need him working on this?

As he stood around, Cas started pacing slowly, eyes still on the ceiling. Could it be that Naomi didn’t trust Bobby, as he was actively trying to destroy her company’s influence? Cas shrugged to himself as he kept vaguely moving back and forth at the top of the stairs. That wasn’t exactly his issue. His job was just to find the Winchesters…

Cas felt an elbow crash into his side and a large book fall onto his foot.

“Thanks, you fucking asshat.”

_Asshat?_

The something that had collided with him was a woman, probably in her mid-twenties, staring at him coldly with bright green eyes as steaming coffee dripped down all over her jeans.

“I am so sorry,” Cas said hurriedly as he bent to pick up her books and half-empty coffee cup.

“Where were you keeping your head, douchebag, outer space?”

“I’m really very sorry, I was waiting on Bobby and…”

“Oh well that helps everything then,” she snapped as she snatched the book pile out of his hands. “Now I need to leave early, so I get changed before work. So thanks dude, you really made my day,” she said as she started stalking away from him down the steps.

“Found my wallet,” Bobby said as he came out behind Cas, who was still watching the woman’s dark blonde ponytail bob its way down the steps. Bobby chuckled at him. “You met Deanna then.” He smirked, proudly. “Piece of work, isn’t she?”

Cas snapped his mouth shut. “Deanna Winchester?”

Bobby smiled, his eyes laughing at him. “That’s the one.”

Cas tried very hard not to groan. Well it looked as though he’d found the Winchesters. And he’d already pissed one of them off.

Perfect.

*


	3. Work and Family

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bobby tries to make a recruit of Cas, and Deanna spends the night with Bela.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, to everyone reading and commenting etc, thank you, you are awesome. I would have been quicker updating but I'm still trying to finish off Along Came Ruby...  
> So, yeah, have ALL THE MINOR CHARACTERS for this chapter because I love them all. (Why are they all dead? Why?) More will be arriving later.  
> And here, have a little bit of sexytimes for Deanna. (Just a little bit)

Deanna clunked her way into the apartment they reserved for meetings, and Ellen put her head up from her laptop, cynically raising an eyebrow as Deanna made for the fridge for a beer. “Jeez, Deanna, we’re only halfway through the day.”

Deanna scowled and raised her bottle, making Ellen wince as she opened it with her teeth. “It’s medicinal, alright?” She sat down beside Ellen, moving the seat out so that she had space to splay her legs.

“I’m having a bad day so far. Jerk upstairs just got me covered in my own coffee – just look at these jeans, Ellen, look at them!”

Ellen looked down at the stains Deanna was gesturing to and smiled slightly before picking her own coffee back up again. “Jerk upstairs… would that be Bobby’s friend? Charlie mentioned something about a ‘dreamy’ looking fellow come to see him about half an hour back.”

Deanna snorted into her coffee. “Charlie just can’t keep her mouth shut.”

But she could bang the nail on the head of a thing when she wanted to. Deanna was well  aware Charlie wasn’t even interested in guys but _dreamy_ … Deanna thought again about those bright, apologetic blue eyes, and decided, yeah, dreamy worked. Even if the guy was a bag of dicks.

“So when are you needing to leave for work then?”

Deanna shrugged. As always with people like Ellen, good people that actually gave a damn about her, she didn’t like talking much about what she did. “Thanks to that guy? I’ll need to go back upstairs and change first...”

Ellen nodded. Deanna was one of the few in the group, like Bobby, who also lived here, renting out from Bobby for cheaper in exchange for constant hands-on work.

“…So yeah. Pretty soon.”

Ellen sighed. “We were trying to reschedule a meeting for now about the rally, but tomorrow’s better I suppose. If Bobby’s busy with his friend, and you’ve got to be working… And Benny and Charlie are around, but Garth’s outta town today, and Sam told me Ruby can’t be around today either… So yeah, let’s make it tomorrow. We can do a Roadhouse social afterwards.”

Ellen smiled at Deanna’s continued bad mood. “Ruby wouldn’t be the other reason you’re in a bad mood, now would it Deanna?”

Jo walked in from the next room, teasing smile on her face. “Deanna’s got a dose of mother-in-law syndrome.”

“Jo,” Deanna growled, as the other girl sat down, “leave it.”

“…You just don’t think anyone’s good enough for Sammy.”

Well, no one was. “That’s not what this is. I just don’t like her. And fuck yeah, he could do better. He’s a law student. He needs someone better for him than a skanky anarchist who has grand plans of blowing things up.”

Jo and Ellen exchanged smiles and Deanna tried to keep her temper down. She was well aware that she wasn’t the only woman at the table who cared about Sam. Hell, since Deanna had been put away, Ellen had raised him, Jo had grown up with him more fully than Deanna had ever been able to – and just for being the wonderful accepting people they were - Deanna owed them an unpayable debt. They had been there to love and protect Sam while Deanna had spent years unable to do the same. And when Deanna had got out, they’d taken her right in to their family.

But dammit, they were wrong about Ruby. Deanna knew it in her gut. She was everything that was bad for Sam, and if she cared about him at all she would take herself away from that. Hell, Deanna knew it was easy enough. When Jo had shown some interest in her, Deanna had known that was a terrible idea for the college student, and had managed to slink her way out of anything happening, and pushed her Charlie’s way.

Speaking of which…

“…Your dog was attacking people again, Sam. Like, jumping his slobbery mouth right up into their face.”

And there was Deanna’s gigantor little brother, following behind the little redhead. “I doubt that Charlie. Khan couldn’t attack something if he tried. That dog is _the_ most pathetic softie there ever was…”

Charlie and Sam took seats at the table again, Charlie continuing to snipe, mildly. “And what sort of a name is Khan for a dog? You could have gone with Scotty or Bones or something…”

“Hey, don’t get at my name choices,” warned Deanna, looking up from her beer. “Sammy came around when I was still inside, asked me what he should call it. I told him.”

Sam threw a bitch face her way. “I don’t know what I was expecting from you.”

Deanna grinned back, her bad mood, as it so often was, lifted at the sight of her brother. Just… gigantic, handsome, well-fed, athletic, and near on genius living proof that there was _something_ Deanna had done right all her life. And besides. She couldn’t ever let him see her look anything less than happy. The guilt of her sacrifice had laid heavily on his shoulders all his life – any time he saw her looking upset, he took it so very personally.

So Sammy always got the smiles out of Deanna, simply by being there.

And dammit she was trying really, really hard not to think about him moving out.

The door opened again, and Benny walked in – Deanna continued smiling wide as he snuck up behind Sam quickly and covered his eyes over.

“Guess who’s back, Sammy Boy,” he said in his slow southern drawl. Deanna watched with interest as Sam’s pout under Benny’s hand turned into a big fat grin as he toppled his way out of his seat to try and get Benny back, who had started running away from him around the kitchen table, his big rumbling laugh settling the rest of the table off. Deanna started spluttering as she tried to gulp down on her beer again, and things only became worse when Bobby and his blue-eyed ‘dreamy’ friend entered the kitchen.

“This is supposed to be an office, y’idjits, now calm down,” he shouted, but Deanna knew he was trying his hardest not to laugh along with them.

Sometimes, this helped, Deanna thought, as she watched Sam go to give Bobby an apologetic bear hug, not noticing yet that Benny had stolen his seat. Just… being here, in the heart of this dysfunctional little family, especially before she had to leave for work. And knowing that they were all here because Bobby Singer had given enough of a damn about her to fight back against the big old power that had landed her in jail… It just made the day go down a little easier. Being around the people who cared.

“Now you’ve all settled a little,” Bobby said, glaring at them all, “I want to introduce you to my friend Castiel. Call him Cas, it flows easier off the tongue. Now Cas, you’ve met Charlie Bradbury-”

“Hi, again!”

“-and this here’s Benny Lafitte, he joined us last year, he’s ex-marines; then that’s Jo Harvelle; this is Sam Winchester beside me-”

Deanna wasn’t being paranoid. Those blue eyes had definitely widened at the mention of Sam’s name.

She supposed, if he was friends with Bobby, then he had to know _something._ Which meant that he knew basically everything about her. She was annoyed at herself at the disappointment she felt. But he seemed like a nice, _smoking hot_ apple-pie guy - call her vain, but she’d have preferred the first thing he’d known about her wasn’t attempted murder.

Not even actual murder. A murder she’d failed at.

“-and that there’s his sister, Deanna, who I, uh,” Bobby grinned slyly, “think you’ve met.”

“Yes,” blue-eyes – Cas – started, staring straight at her. It was unnerving, the intensity of that stare. Most guys looked at you like they wanted a look at what was under you clothes. This one stared like he was looking at your soul. She felt way more exposed under it.

“I truly am sorry, Deanna, for getting in your way.”

Ok, he really did seem sorry.

She waved a hand dismissively at him. “Nah, it’s cool.”

She noticed that Bobby was giving her an odd smile before he turned to introduce Ellen, who’d got out of her own seat to lean against the surface next to him, “And… and this is Ellen, Cas, my, uh...”

“Wife? Pleased to meet you Ellen,” Cas finished, holding out a hand to Ellen.

Deanna wasn’t really the giggling type, but now watching Bobby’s face turn beetroot with embarrassment, she couldn’t help herself. Bobby eyed her with a frustrated look of betrayal as he tried to speak again over the laughter in the room.

“No, Ellen’s my _second-in-command_. We’re not married, Cas.”

Poor guy, Deanna thought to herself with amusement as his face fell, while Ellen finally shook his hand with a smile. He just didn’t seem able to catch a break with them all today. “My apologies,” he said quickly, in his deep, unexpectedly gravelly baritone. “I – I just assumed…”

Ellen gave him a warm smile. “It’s alright, we get you.”

Deanna checked the old wristwatch that had once been her father’s. “Ok, I need to bounce. Leave some time to _get changed_ and all that,” she said, shooting a teasing glance in Cas’ direction as she downed her beer. Her mouth lingered for just a moment longer than it needed to around the rim of the bottle as she tried to see if she was going to get a reaction.

Cas looked a little… uncomfortable, maybe. But he still wasn’t looking away.

“I’ll catch-up with you all tomorrow alright? I’m probably at Bela’s tonight,” she said as she put down her drink and stood up, making to leave the room. But then Benny stood up as well and caught her arm.

“I’ll leave with you, Dee,” he told her. She tried not to groan. Not this again.

“Alright.”

As soon as they made it outside the door, Benny stopped her walking back upstairs by putting his hand on the wall next to her, across from him.

Deanna raised an eyebrow coldly. She was very fond of Benny, but she didn’t like people standing in her way. “What now?” she sighed at him.

“Alistair Folter,” he said quietly. “Folks are saying he’s gone into business with your Lilith.”

Deanna rolled her eyes, but what she wanted to do was scream at him to keep his voice down. She wanted her family knowing as little as possible about... Well. All of it.

“She’s not _my_ Lilith, alright?”

“She’s the one who pays your bills.” He raised his eyebrows, daring her to deny it. “But Folter… He’s a whole other game that you don’t want to be playing, sweetheart.”

Deanna stared up at him, lips pursed, chin raised up, and trying not to let him see what she was thinking. Hell, she didn’t _want_ anything to do with Folter…

“Dee, I just need your word you’re not about to get any further into this. You got a lot of people who care about you here, and nobody wants to see you get hurt.”

“Benny… thanks for caring, alright? But it’s my life, and I’m going to do what I want with it. Now will you let me upstairs?”

Reluctantly, still with the concern dripping out of his big soppy eyes, he raised his arm, and let her start stomping off up the stairs.

“Look, darlin’, I just don’t want you feeling like you only got the one choice. You’ve got everything else going for you.”

As Deanna turned the corner of the staircase, she pretended she hadn’t heard him, and like a moody teenage brat, kept on walking away.

“ _You’ve got everything else going for you.”_

_Maybe. Maybe I did, once._

*

Ellen had complained that it wasn’t her bar, the Roadhouse, that Bobby was taking Cas along to, but Bobby had told her to “stop nagging at him,” and that this place was closer.

In Cas’ defence, they certainly _acted_ married.

“So, that was the crew, or some of it at least,” Bobby said as they sat down at a booth. “What did you think?”

Cas smiled. “They seemed wonderful,” he answered honestly.

Bobby grunted, but Cas could see his proud smile under his whiskers. “Yeah. Also useless, loud and obnoxious most of the time.”

Someone came by to get drinks orders from them. Cas didn’t usually drink, but as this was Bobby, he ordered the same pint as the other man. “Do most of them live in the apartment building?”

“Some. Ellen and Jo, they have their own place, and Benny’s got a home nearby with his wife, Andrea – she sometimes comes along to meetings too, only she’s late into her pregnancy now, and doesn’t always have the patience these days. Yeah it’s just me, and Ash – he does most of the legwork on our internet campaigns – but the Winchesters stick around, though they keep different apartments now. Idjits wouldn’t stop sniping at each other.” Bobby sighed. “But now Sam’s moving out – he’s got a couple of flatmates lined up – he wants to be closer to his college.” He shook his head, smiling a little. “I don’t know if Deanna’s gonna take it well. She’s not said anything yet but, well, she rarely does say much.”

“Have they stayed with you since Deanna… got out?”

“Yeah. I mean, Sam, he was happy living with the Harvelles – good people, as you could tell. Ellen loved that boy as much as she did Jo. And I’d known her years, through all those times visiting Sam, so she was just about the first person to know when I started this whole crazy campaign.” He blushed again, just slightly. “But when Deanna came to stay with me Sam moved in too – they’d been apart too long.” He shook his head again. “I just don’t know if that boy’s ever gonna stop feeling guilty over something.”

Cas narrowed his eyes. Sam’s guilt couldn’t be made any easier if he knew anything as much as Cas did about what his sister did now.

He had been stood nearest the door back in that kitchen, and Benny was not a quiet man. Alistair Folter… He’d had quite the reputation in the force, as that one guy that everyone had come _so close_ to catching. Surely, Bobby, as an ex-cop, couldn’t know.

“What is it Deanna does Bobby? She doesn’t have a paid position with you, does she?”

Bobby snorted. “Hardly. Nah, she makes her own way. It’s hard for her, y’know? Getting jobs and all that with a record like her’s stamped over any CV… Yeah, she freelances, does some sales.”

Cas nodded slowly.

Bobby didn’t know. And it would break his heart if he found out.

Was this the sort of thing Naomi would want to know? Was it the sort of thing Cas ought to tell her? Michael Devas may not be so enthusiastic at playing welcoming family to the prodigals if he knew about any of this…

“…here you are boys,” said the waitress, laying down their pints on the table in front of them.

“Thanks Pam,” Bobby told her, looking up with a winning smile. “These first ones on the house?”

She whacked his baseball cap lightly with her empty tray. “Cheeky! Although,” she added, turning to regard Cas. “For you, honey? Come back along later and I’ll gladly let you get me a drink.”

Cas struggled to get words out. It had been a long time since he was in a position to need to _flirt_ with someone. “Uhh…”

“Leave him alone, y’mantis,” Bobby growled, as she grinned.

“I’ll be seeing you Bobby,” she said, walking off, with her hips swaying confidently.

Bobby looked at Cas strangely. “You tried… playing the court at all since…”

“Uh, no, not really, no.”

“And you and Anna, you’ve never…”

Cas’ smile felt strained. Questions like this always made him feel under interrogation. “We’ve always been more like siblings Bobby.”

“Course, course. Yeah, you should bring her out to see me at some point, she was a good one, Anna.” He smiled ruefully. “But you, Cas, you need to get out more again.”

“So Anna tells me.”

“Hey, you’re in your thirties now, I’m not saying you have to go mad on the strip every night. Just… get out and meet more people. Do more things than just work.”

“I have my choir nights.”

Bobby didn’t just roll his eyes, he rolled his entire head. “You need something else, Cas, everyone does. Hell, that’s how this whole thing got started for me. Retirement was boring as all shit. Hey, you should join us,” he continued, a sparkle in his eye, “it’d be nice to see you more often. And I’m always looking for more people to recruit into the cause. Mostly all we do is organise rallies and petitions, but sometimes what we do ends up pretty important, supporting all the families left behind by the soldiers. Government just doesn’t do enough.” He smiled gruffly. “What d’you think?”

“…I’d like that, Bobby. But… maybe I’ll think on it a bit?”

He was going to need to have a talk with Naomi about how to proceed in all of this.

Bobby took a drink from his glass. “Well you might as well come along tomorrow. I think the plan now is a meeting, and then a social at Ellen’s place. Good way to dip your toes in.”

“That sounds good.”

It might just get Anna off his back about getting out more.

And maybe… maybe it would be nice to find out a little more about Deanna. For more reasons than Naomi needed him to.

*

When they’d finished working, Deanna, as she so often did, went back to Bela’s flat with her. They’d known each other so long now all one of them needed to do was throw the other a look, and they’d know what kind of mood they were in – whether they needed alcohol, and lots of it, or just to curl up in bed alone, or whether they needed someone sharing that bed with them, and fucking them into oblivion.

Tonight was one of the latter times. Deanna knew that look.

Two murderous little girls carrying a truckload of daddy issues around with them, thrown together as cellmates, and fifteen years on Deanna had never quite been able to keep herself away. Because the sorry fact was that loved as she was by others, nobody else quite _got_ her like Bela did.

It wasn’t like they were the same person or anything. Bela was so much more... Well, her own person. She had that same clawing emptiness to her, but she didn’t have the same need to fill it, not like Deanna did. No, she focused everything inward, made herself stronger, smarter, more gorgeous…

Deanna called her a vain, money-grabbing bitch. Bela tended to take that as compliment: she knew Deanna well-enough to hear the respect she’d garnered there.

“You got anything to drink around here?” Deanna asked as they entered the spacey, open-plan flat. It was so different from home – it always looked like some sort of show-home: neat, gleaming and expensive. Deanna always wondered who Bela was trying to prove anything to – Deanna knew she was the only one around here regularly, and Hell, she certainly didn’t care how clean the place was. If anything it sorta creeped her out.

“Nothing, except that vodka from last week.”

Deanna glared at her grumpily, and started pouring them both some. She slid the shot she’d poured in Bela’s glass across to her, but the other woman had already moved through to her living room. Her back to Deanna, Bela had already started to slide out of her dress, and moments later Deanna was left staring at the other woman’s lacy black underwear, tightly hugging at her tanned, essentially perfect figure. Bela walked back over to the kitchen, her hips swaying, with a big smirk on her face.

“It was too warm in here anyway,” she stated matter-of-factly, before downing her shot.

Deanna shrugged, and drank her own.

Bela moved slowly around the kitchen counter to put a hand on Deanna’s arm. “Deanna, you’re wearing one of your brother’s old shirts again,” she moaned, fiddling with the cheap fabric.

“Nah, this one’s mine.”

“Ugh, that’s even worse.”

Still with the strong look of distaste on her face, Bela leaned up slightly to kiss Deanna, her teeth toying slightly with her bottom lip, promising more, asking for more. She smiled now, and tugged on Deanna’s arm, leading her along the corridor to her bedroom.

“So. How was life before work for you?”

“Nothing happened. No,” Deanna corrected herself as she slumped down on Bela’s bed, purposefully messing up the covers, “Wait, I met a pretty guy. He made me get coffee all down my jeans. The nice jeans,” she added as Bela put her knees on the bed, straddling Deanna’s waist, getting Deanna to hold her there.

“You have nice jeans?”

“Hah. Ha. Not funny, bitch,” Deanna deadpanned before her mouth was taken out of action by Bela’s own, while Bela’s long fingers started raking up through Deanna’s hair, deftly pulling out the scrunchie holding it all messily in place.

“You,” Bela complained as she started leaving long, lingering kisses on Deanna’s neck, “have far too many tangles in your hair. You need it cut.”

Deanna snorted. “Really, now? What are we, _domestic_ all of a sudden?”

Bela narrowed her eyes, seemingly taking that as an insult. Before she could say anything though, Deanna got a good grip on her arms, and spun her on her back, so that Bela’s back was lying on her lovely crisp bedsheets, and Deanna was perched above her. Grinning, and crawling over Bela and the bed like a tiger, Deanna reached Bela’s face, her hair framing it like a bright halo, and dipped her face in to kiss Bela, who was still looking grumpy about the domestic comment.

But Deanna knew how to fix that.

Deanna had always felt uncomfortable with the idea of lying in bed, just waiting to be taken, to trust someone else to make the move, to take care of her. No, Deanna liked proving to people, again and again if need be, why they wanted her there, why they _needed_ her there. Their needs always had to come first, or she would start to feel… well, needy, greedy and somehow _exposed._

But this, she thought as her lips lingered over Bela’s neck, and collarbone, her teeth teasing ever so slowly over her lovely nipples after she’d unclipped the bra, this she liked best. It made her feel stronger in herself somehow. Right now, as she slowly started to slide Bela’s underwear away down her legs, while her lips pressed gently into Bela’s stomach, Deanna felt almost powerful. Just for a little while, she was going to make someone _need_ her, need her so bad that they were going to have to scream out her name and beg for release.

One arm curling up around Bela’s neck, Deanna lay down beside her and smiled, looking into eyes that challenged her every time.

…So then she started opening Bela, using her fingers, all the time maintaining eye-contact as slowly she watched Bela lose it.

“Do you need more?” Deanna whispered, smiling as Bela narrowed her eyes. She knew Bela hated to have to ask.

“Yes,” she gasped eventually, letting the word escape through gritted teeth as Deanna’s fingers  dove deeper inside her.

Deanna moved her free hand to guide herself, pushing on Bela’s body, as she slid down the bed and off it, listening hard to catch Bela’s slight moan as Deanna’s fingers pulled back out of her.

Carefully, Deanna started to push Bela’s legs further apart from where she crouched at the bottom of the bed.

“So do you still need more?” she murmured, her mouth poised between Bela’s legs. Playfully, Bela used one of them to hit her over the back of the head.

Bela turned off the bedside lamp, plunging the room into darkness.

“Get the fuck on with it, Winchester.”

And grinning, Deanna did.

She was never going to be book-smart like her brother. She was probably never going to be able to raise a family like Ellen, or like Benny was going to.

The Devas’ would probably never pay for anything they’d done, and Mr dreamy blue-eyes (‘Call-Him-Cas’) would probably never come by to see her again.

But right now, life was sweet. Because Deanna had a tongue, and she knew damn well how to use it.

*

“Castiel! I wasn’t expecting to hear from you quite this soon.”

“I wasn’t expecting to have any news so fast,” he said, twiddling a pen at his desk as she did so. “But I looked up John Winchester’s old partner – Bobby Singer. The Winchesters are both currently live with him, they’re a part of his campaign group.”

“His campaign group?” Naomi asked, a strange excitement in her voice. “The… ‘Arms Off!’ campaign?”

“…Yes.” Cas frowned, and not simply because Naomi seemed to have a certain over-enthusiasm for her use of quotation marks. How did she seem already to know?

“Castiel, can I change our deal slightly? How would it be if you continued to… keep an eye on them both? You could continue perhaps to convince them, gently, that Devascorp isn’t something they need to fear, to fight against – remind them that we are family. But… keep an eye on them. Let me know any developments the Winchesters may be involved in, within the groups’ efforts.”

“Why?”

“Although I appreciate the good work Mr Singer’s group does, I am also very aware that they actively work against Michael’s company. Before Michael welcomes them home, it may be good if we could all... get to know a little more about one another.”

Cas didn’t like the sound of that. It sounded altogether too much like _spying_ and he had always prized himself in his work for being honest.

“Just… let us know how deeply they’re involved in the anti-arms movement. And let them know a little more about us.”

Cas stayed quiet.

“That’s not so hard for you, is it, Castiel? I will, of course, extend your payment for the job…”

*


	4. Copious Quantities of Alcohol

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Castiel is introduced to the rest of the Arms Off crew and Deanna ensures he has a memorable night to forget.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, profusely sorry about the late update. Too many nights drinking instead of writing… Hope this is living up to hopes/expectations so far, this is another chapter stuffed full of minor characters and a tiny amount of smut.  
> Thanks so much to everyone reading, especially to the special, special snowflakes who comment.  
> Also. The internet was unable to tell me whether America has pitchers - it kept wanting to tell me about baseball, which is not what I was meaning... anyone know?

When Bobby eventually woke up and came into his kitchen, Deanna grinned at him, and sat down at his table with a new pot of coffee. “Breakfast, Bobby?”

“What are you doing in here, girl? It’s not ten in the morning yet,” Bobby growled at her as he sat down beside her, taking the mug she’d slid along to him, as she shrugged.

“I dunno. I couldn’t sleep. I only got back a few hours ago,” Deanna admitted, grinning catlike into the steam rising from her own mug. “We went… a few rounds last night.”

 _Some of which involved a few of Bela’s toys,_ she finished to herself as Bobby rolled his eyes.

“I’d have thought that instead of wandering through town alone in the early morning you might actually, I dunno, spend a whole night sleeping in your girlfriend’s bed, Deanna?”

Deanna snorted. “Not my girlfriend. We’re neither of us-”

“…The type. I heard.”

_“You know we’re not exactly the exclusive type,” Bela had smirked at her from the bed that morning. “I don’t know what’s getting into you.”_

_Deanna turned back, eyes narrowed as she tackled her feet into her boots. “This isn’t about me, Bela, I’m not a sap.” Well. Not much. “It’s just common sense. You don’t start sleeping with the boss.”_

_Bela sat up and started playing with Deanna’s hair, leaning her head on Deanna’s shoulder. “Lilith isn’t exactly a regular boss.”_

_“You’re right, she’s the Queen Bitch of Hell.”_

_Deanna didn’t look round but she could feel Bela’s smirk on her skin. “Are you afraid of her, Dee?”_

_“No,” Deanna growled, “I just don’t like her. She’s fucking weird when she’s high, and downright evil when she’s not. Any case, I don’t wanna touch you until you’re done with each other again. I don’t want to catch something.”_

_Bela whacked her lightly on the shoulder with a pillow. “Fine, then. But you know you might even enjoy joining us one night. The boss can be very generous…”_

_Deanna shuddered violently at the thought and leapt out of her seat on the bed. “Believe me, Bela, she is all yours.”_

“…yeah we’re… we’re giving it another break for a while.”

Bobby smiled. “Good. She’s messed up, that one.”

“So am I.”

“No, you’ve been messed around a lot. There’s a difference.”

“Hmm.”

Bobby kept looking at her, which she allowed, since it was him. More than anyone, he was always there to listen when she needed to talk. It wasn’t that nobody else cared, or tried – Sam, bless him, never stopped trying to get to the bleeding heart of things – but Bobby knew how she felt about needing her own space sometimes. So he’d insisted on her having her own apartment here, and he tried to stop other people badgering her at all about her past, encouraging them to follow his own example in the matter, which was simply to be there, for whenever she did want to say something, if ever.

“So. Did you bring bacon or have you walked into my kitchen empty handed?”

Deanna grinned and produced an unopened packet from her backpack on the ground, which she waved at him happily. “Ash and Sammy left their door open again. And Sam always keeps the fridge well-stocked, even if he does live on rabbit food most of the time.”

Bobby took the packet out of her hand, smiling, and went rummaging around in his own fridge for eggs. “Yeah, gonna have to start checking up on Ash after Sam’s gone, Him being an idjit who doesn’t keep himself fed.” As he reached to turn on his stove he used the other hand to point the packet of bacon at Deanna, saying, “needs to learn you can’t live off computers. Not yet anyway.”

“You’re right there,” she agreed, trying again not to think about what they were talking about. Just a few days now, and Sam would be gone. Oh he’d still be back all the time, sure, he’d still be helping out… but this was only the start. The start of Sam moving upwards and away…

“So, uh,” Bobby started saying, over the sound of frying meat, “I invited Cas along tonight.”

“The dude in the trenchcoat from yesterday?”

Bobby nodded. “That’s the one. Think I might be making a new recruit out of him.”

Deanna stuck her lip out, considering. “Huh. He seemed alright, I guess. After the part where he knocked into me.” Dammit she still needed to get those jeans washed. “Who is he anyway, what d’you know him from?”

“He was a cop, Dee, a good one. I trained him.”

“Then of course he was good,” Deanna said, amused. Though she was a little relieved to hear that this was another ex-cop, and not a practising one, like Garth. That could have been awkward, getting another one of those around - one that wasn’t just a loveable hippy.

“Damn straight. Yeah, kinda sad seeing him now, though he seems to be coping well enough. But I dunno, he seemed a lot happier back in the day.” Bobby paused to start loading up a plate with bacon, and eggs. “Come take a plate.”

“Thanks.” Deanna didn’t sit down after she reached her plate, just leant on the kitchen side next to it and started nibbling. “So, uh, what happened? He didn’t seem too unhappy to me.”

Although he did have those big sad eyes, so sincere when he tried apologising…

Bobby frowned. “Few years back now, just after I left the force, his wife was in a car accident, and a few days later, Cas had to go into the hospital and get them to pull the plug.”

“God.”

“Yeah,” Bobby sighed as he loaded his own plate and turned off the stove. “It weren’t easy for him, from what I hear.” As they sat back down at the table together Bobby looked solemn for a moment, and Deanna wondered if he was thinking of his own wife, dead twenty years now.

Of course, when he’d been made a widower, he’d got through it, unlike his old partner. And apparently, so had this Cas guy. Deanna could admire that sorta strength.

“So meeting tonight then?”

“Yeah. And then I was gonna lead us along to Harvelle’s. Ellen’s been saying we haven’t been along in too long.”

Deanna smirked. “Dude, she has you so whipped.”

Bobby narrowed his eyes. “Finish your bacon. Then you can help me out with the notes for the meeting.” His lips creeped up at their corners, teasing her. “We’ve got a campaign to run, kid.”

Deanna groaned as she reached for her mug and downed the end of her coffee.

“Awesome.”

*

 _Arms_ _Off!_ Cas was learning, may not have uncountable numbers of serious members, but those that it had certainly seemed… memorable. He’d spent the meeting sat between Benny and a small, slight man named Garth, who was one of the strangest people Cas thought he’d ever met in his life. Throughout the group discussion about the planned rally, which mostly seemed to involve a long, drawn-out argument about who could be trusted to successfully create and print the flyers for this (Charlie seemed to end up with this one in the end), Garth had little to say, but every word seemed carefully thought out in order to placate, and look responsible in front of Bobby, who he seemed to idolise. Cas had never met the man before, but the moment he’d walked in, Garth had known him.

“You’re Castiel DiAngelo, aren’t you?” The man had asked, pulling him down into a surprisingly tight bear hug. “I was so sorry to hear about your wife,” he told Cas solemnly, Cas frantically trying to work out how he could know him, “But I was so glad to hear you left the force, you’re meant for better things.”

“Uh… Thank you.” Another cop then. “Sorry it’s…”

“Garth,” Garth told him, shaking the hand held out to him enthusiastically, “Garth Fitzgerald IV.”

 “Good to meet you properly.”

“Bobby’s thinking of signing you up with us then? Oh – try the Sweet Ears that Linda made,” Garth added as he leant forward to the middle of the table and dragged over an open lunchbox, a child’s nametag plastered on the front, that had been yellowed with years, emblazoned with the name _Kevin._ “You haven’t lived until you’ve tried the Tran sweet ears.”

Although often cautious with unfamiliar foods put in front of him, and though the brown, sticky snacks seemed a little daunting, Cas had a strong feeling that the small, almost aggressively friendly women taking a look at them was the creator, and without thinking about it any further, had a try.

“Amazing, aren’t they?”

“Mmph,” Cas tried, through a large mouthful. It had been a while since he’d had anything sweet, it had always been Daphne who’d enjoyed buying in large quantities of chocolate and cookies – particularly once she’d started to get her pregnancy cravings…

_‘Did you bring home the Fruit Loops this time?’_

_‘…Are those the ones with the green dwarf, or the demented toucan?’_

_‘For your sake, I hope you’re joking, Emmanuel.’_

“So… Garth,” Cas asked as they took a seat down at the table, “are you still on the force yourself?”

“Oh, yeah, sure, for now. But soon I’ll have saved up the money I need to get me and my wife out of civilisation for good.”

“Really?”

“We’ve found this incredible commune…” 

Yes, Bobby’s group seemed to have attracted its fair share of _interesting_ characters that Cas imagined would certainly alarm Naomis sensibilities. Because there were a few more… well, intense characters, who sat near the back of the group but frequently had their voices heard the loudest. One of the girls among them had her hand clasped around Sam’s throughout most of the meeting, as she joined in with ‘Meg’, and ‘Tyson’ when they railed against the entire idea of another march, and more petitions. Apparently they wanted more definitive action taken, although Cas was not entirely sure they knew what form this would take. Bobby became increasingly irate with them as the time passed, although his frustration had nothing on Deanna’s. She looked at the girl sat next to Sam, Ruby, Cas learned later, as though she were a wasp she wanted to squash with a newspaper.

Eventually, the meeting came to a close, and Cas was left feeling that Naomi had nothing concrete to worry about, in concerns to the Winchesters themselves – though the group did have more radical members, they didn’t seem terribly active, or to have much influence here – and feeling like he himself, genuinely, might be interested in helping more with what was trying to achieve here. And he had missed Bobby, he thought, smiling as he watched Bobby stand up and at last declaring an end of the meeting.

“Right, clear outta hear, y’ijits. I’m off to the Roadhouse for a drink, you’re all welcome to join me.”

There was some mild groaning, and some muttering about how far the place was from Bobby’s apartment building, but Bobby steeled his face like he was back to getting his police recruits back in line. “As I say, _I’m_ going to the Roadhouse, and I’m _expecting_ you all to be following me.”

“Twenty percent off for you lot, remember,” Ellen chimed in, looking smug.

Apparently the thought of cheap alcohol was enough to override the irritation at the long walk for everyone, as slowly they all started to get to their feet and pick up their coats. Cas found himself walking along with Jo and Charlie, who were quite happily walking along holding hands. “So Castiel,” Charlie asked, “You’re a detective?”

“Not a terribly successful one.”

Charlie made a dismissive gesture. “Doesn’t matter. I was just wondering whether you chose that coat on purpose…”

Cas groaned. “I should get rid of this thing,” he muttered.

“I dunno,” Jo said, smiling up at him, “I think it’s sexy.”

Charlie gave her a dig in the ribs. “So am I allowed to call you Columbo now, or would that be annoying?”

Cas didn’t sigh, but he came close. If Anna ever got to meet Charlie, she was going to love her.

The Roadhouse wasn’t quite so far away as he’d been led to expect – in just over twenty minutes, which Charlie had used to make him far more informed on the group dynamics, they’d made it there. Cas liked the look of the place, there was something worn and familiar about it, that made him feel at home the moment he walked in the door. It maybe wasn’t going to be all that easy to keep the lines between work and pleasure, despite Naomi’s curiously large financial incentive for the struggle. Because though his job certainly seemed easy enough, he wasn’t sure how much he liked the thought of starting it. He wasn’t doing anything _wrong_ , particularly, but it made him feel dirty, holding his secrets to his chest amongst people who’d made him feel more relaxed than he had in a long time.

“Heya, Ellen,” called the mulleted-man behind the bar, laughing as the rest of the group all filed into the bar behind her. “What’s that, like twenty, thirty, tequila shots on the house?”

“Ash, you dumbass. This is a twenty percent off night, there’ll be no free rounds coming from my business. Don’t gimme that face, Deanna.”

Ah, so this was Ash, Sam’s current roommate at Bobby’s, according to what Charlie had been telling Cas. He didn’t _look_ like the resident computer hacker… so it was probably a good thing that Cas wasn’t here to investigate him. He certainly gave Cas an interesting stare as he went up to order a beer for himself, feeling a little out of place as the group all started breaking off to sit in separate parts of the bar.

“New guy, huh?”

“That’s me.”

“Friendly piece of advice for you tonight then, amigo,” Ash said as he started filling a glass for Cas. “Avoid. Deanna.”

Cas looked puzzled. “Why?” He smiled nervously, fighting the urge to look behind him and seek her out with his eyes.

“She’s on rocky grounds with her off-again girlfriend, and she’ll be in a worse mood as long as she has to keep looking at little Ruby over there wrapping herself around her brother. You get me?”

Cas started nodding, before shaking his head. “Well, I have seen she’s got something of a temper…” He was thinking of the coffee incident now.

“Dude, Deanna in a _temper_ is gonna think about shooting you. But Deanna _drinking_ and in a mood like she’s in…” Ash whistled. “She’s gonna be looking around for somebody to cheer her up. And that poor SOB’s gonna be left in the morning with their heart all torn up, and their head pounding like it’s December ’69 come again and all of Altamont just moved in next door. Comprende?”

“I – uh… think so. Thanks, Ash.”

“No problem, buddy. Hey what they say your name was again?”

“Castiel,” Cas said, holding out the hand not holding onto his beer, which Ash proceeded to slap, almost making Cas spill his drink, but not quite.

“Cassss-tiel. That some sort of Biblical thing?”

“Yeah… something like that.”

Having just been warned off Deanna so officially, Cas thought that his quest was best continued now talking with Sam, and went to sit by him. Sam was in the middle of the louder group from the meeting – it was strange, but they all seemed to be wearing dark clothes, and all wore similarly moody expressions.

“Is it alright if I sit here?”

Sam looked up, and smiled a welcome. “Sure, Cas, take a seat. Right, let me introduce you to these guys – we didn’t really get round to that in the meeting, did we?” Extricating his arm from Ruby’s back, to her irritation, he started pointing at his friends in turn. “This is Tyson, Meg, Gus and Casey.” He grinned, putting his arm back around Ruby, as a pillow. “And this sleepy one is Ruby.”

“Hey,” she muttered, smiling cynically as she leant back against Sam and closed her eyes.

The dark-haired Meg sat up and regarded him… curiously. It was a while since a woman had looked at him with so much attention anyway.

“What did you think of your first meeting? Did you find it… exciting?”

Cas ignored the bitterness in her tone. “It’s interesting to join when the group seems so close to getting something done, with this march. It sounds as though Bobby has thought everything out very well.”

Meg snorted, and Tyson started to laugh.

“Not everyone’s so sure old Bobby’s taking big enough steps in this fight,” Meg explained, with Sam starting to look uncomfortable. Meg noticed. “C’mon Sammy, you’ve said so yourself.”

Sam looked at Cas bashfully. “Bobby’s great – and he did awesome in getting us all started, it’s just… some of us were hoping that when we joined we’d end up seeing a bit more change coming out of it, y’know?”

Cas nodded. “I understand that it can be… frustrating, waiting for change to arrive.”

“The entire point of being here isn’t to wait for anything. We’re supposed to be _doing_ something for ourselves,” Casey said, speaking low. “Not sitting around in the same shithole, drinking and getting nothing done.”

But her face fell in embarrassment as Sam sat up, solemnly staring her down. “Leave Ellen’s bar alone.”

“Sorry, Sam.”

Awkwardly, Cas cleared his throat. “So… what is it you would do, had you the leadership, Sam?”

Sam turned back to him and nodded, clearly thinking about how to phrase something. “What we really need to be thinking about now is – _oh shit.”_ It was comical how quickly Sam’s face fell, as his gaze became distracted by something behind Cas. Beside him, Ruby started laughing darkly.

Looking around, Cas watched as a young woman approached them, wearing a big, beaming smile. “Hiya, Castiel, I never introduced myself – I’m Becky, the blogger for the cause.” She sat herself purposefully between Cas and Sam, and though she offered Cas her hand, her attention was clearly more focused on the latter man. “If there’s _anything_ you need to feel more included, or if you have an idea you want to see published on the website, _please_ do let me know.” And earnestly, she placed a hand on his leg. Gus seemed to be barely restraining himself from laughter.

“I – thank you Becky,” Cas said slowly, leaning back in his chair, away from Becky, who was still mostly keeping her attention on Sam.

“Bobby tells me you’re a cop?”

“Eh, was,” Cas stuttered as he tried to down his drink as possible. Surprised, a moment later he realised with relief that he was now holding an empty glass. He hadn’t drank anything that quickly since college.

“I’ll, uh, just go and… get another of these.”

Becky’s face fell slightly, but not as much as Sam’s did. “Oh, ok!”

Ash seemed to have finished his shift, or was at least taking a break – in any case Jo had taken his place behind the bar, and was talking to Deanna at the bar stool in front of her. Both women smiled as he approached them, though Deanna’s looked different to how she’d smiled around the table with her family the day before. This was a little more… appraising.

“Castiel, come pull up a stool,” she told him. “Jo, can you get me another two of Ash’s funky shots?”

Jo raised her eyebrows, looking between them both as Cas sat down.

“The ‘Purple Nurples’? Alright…”

As she turned away to go behind the bar and get whatever extra ingredients the dubious sounding shots required, Deanna put her elbow up on the bar and leant on her hand to stare at Cas. Her long hair draped over the bar like a veil…

_“Avoid. Deanna.”_

He was here on business. He was here to speak to Deanna purely _on business._ And he would remember that.

“So saw you talking to Becky over there,” Deanna, said, smothering a laugh.

“She seems… enthusiastic.”

“Yeah, enthusiastic for my brother.” She looked over at him. “Not that you aren’t attractive, but that was probably her attempt at making Sam jealous.” She shook her head. “Nutjob. Although. Being honest, she’d probably still be a better girlfriend for Sam than the one he has.”

“Two purple nurples.”

“Twenty percent, right?”

Jo grinned as Deanna held her out a bill. “Dee, its Mom. For you, she means fifty.”

“Boom.”

As Jo turned her attention to a new group entering the bar, Deanna looked back to Cas. “Bottom’s up, then?”

Not even Balthazar had been able to convince Cas that shots were a good idea in more than ten years.

Deanna’s cat-green eyes challenging him, they downed the shots together.

“Not bad, huh?”

“Uhm, certainly _interesting…_ ”

“We should get more after Jo gets back.”

Partly in an attempt to break the intensity of Deanna’s eye contact, Cas brought up Ruby again. “So what is it you don’t like about her?”

Deanna shrugged. “Got all these crazy plans about what we should be doing. Hell, I even heard her say we should start sending letterbombs along to Devascorp. I mean, she was drunk, but seriously. I’ve met girls like her before, and they’re all insane about some cause or other, and they never want to move on and do anything practical with their lives.” She shook her head. “Sam wants to be a lawyer? Girl like her is the last thing he needs.”

Cas tried to nod as noncommittally as possible.

“And Sam’s moving out next week, trying to start things fresh… If that’s what he wants, he should do it properly. Hey, Jo – you guys still do pitchers, right?”

As she passed them by, Jo rolled her eyes, but she reached for a jug. Cas tried not to make a face as she started filling it up. More colourful alcohol…

“Bobby said something yesterday about you… not being all that happy about Sam moving out.”

“Oh yeah?” Suddenly her face seemed to shut down. “Bobby tell you a lot about me?”

Cas stuttered as Jo put down the filled jug in front of them, with multiple straws pointing out in every direction. “Well…”

“Grab a straw, dude, no way am I drinking this on my own.”

Obediently, and feeling like an idiot teenager again, Cas took a first sip as she glared at him, looking a little more amused again.

“You’ll have heard something about me doing time then?”

There seemed to be no point in saying anything else. “Yes.”

She leaned in to drink out of several straws at once. “What d’you think of that then, cop?”

“I’m not a cop. And I think… I’m curious to hear your side about what happened the night you tried to kill your uncle,” he told her honestly. Really, it seemed to be the factor missing in most of the reports on the crime.

She smiled again. “You never stop being a cop. But that was a good answer, I like you.”

“If that side of the family ever tried making contact again, perhaps to offer recompense,” Cas asked, seizing his small window of opportunity, “how would you take it, you and Sam?”

Deanna sat drinking out of her straws for a while. “I’d tell them all to shove it,” she said eventually. “I mean why d’you think we’re all here? If by some miracle we went mad and forgave them, how could we take their money, I mean, possibly? No one knows better than we do the blood money that is.”

Cas nodded, trying not to feel disappointed. Of course nothing would ever be so simple.

“So. What kind of a name is Castiel anyway?”

Cas smiled at the abrupt subject-change. “You know, I never asked what that was about. My parents were a little odd.”

Deanna looked distractedly into their emptying pitcher. “Joooooo,” she called. “We’re gonna need another one of these…”

“I’m fine,” Cas amended hurriedly, but Jo had already picked up another jug and started filling it up.

“The new guy wants you to stop plying him with drinks, Dee,” Jo taunted, winking, as she went over to the other side of the bar for ice and stopped in her tracks. “Andy. You’re like, five hours late. You don’t get a drinks deal if you don’t turn up for the meeting.”

“Aww, c’mon Jo, but I’m your friend!”

“You’re _Sam’s_ friend. And he’s over there.” Cas watched with interest as ‘Andy’s’ face fell as Deanna pointed back over to where Sam was sitting.

“But he’s with Ruby’s mates…” He made a face. “And they’re a little…” Seemingly unable to find a suitable adjective, Andy stopped and shuddered.

“Here, here!” Deanna called as Jo set down another pitcher beside her. “Knew there was a reason I liked him,” she muttered.

As Andy continued to badger Jo behind them, Deanna started humming, and eventually singing along with the song, “… but Gollum, and the _evil one…_ c’mon, Cas, you not gonna sing along?”

“I don’t know this song, Deanna.”

“Dude, this is Zeppelin, this is classic!” She punched him not-so-lightly on the arm. “Your parents were strange, what the hell did they raise you on?”

“There was mostly a lot of country. Johnny Cash, and friends.” Deanna looked physically pained.

“Ok, by the end of the night, I _am_ gonna get you dancing to some of this – it’s on all night, I saw Ash put the Mothership album on awhile back…”

Cas smiled nervously, Ash’s name bringing back the memory of his ‘warning’. And he had good reasons of his own to avoid any entanglements with Deanna… good reasons…

“I don’t really dance.”

“It’s not exactly rocket science, dude. Wait until they put on the Riverside Blues. Then I’ll start dancing, and I’ll get you on your feet too, and really the night’s just gonna go downhill from there. Calling it.” She narrowed her eyes at him, pushing the pitcher his way. “Drink up.”

His entire point in coming here was to gain the Winchesters’ trust, he reminded himself as they did eventually start dancing, after a round of tequila with Andy and Charlie. This was all… justifiable, it would all be justifiable in the morning.

But there was nothing professional about the way he was letting Deanna dance with him. It was definitely more of a passive thing on Cas’ end – he really couldn’t dance, and he felt far more inebriated after standing up for the first time in a while. But all he wanted to do was pull Deanna even closer towards him, and move better in sync with her. He just felt so uncoordinated though, and Deanna was so beautiful. And he hadn’t had anyone press against him like this in…

 _Dammit Daphne_.

Following their lead, Charlie had got Andy dancing, and in turn that had got Ash up on the dancefloor, along with Sam and his friends. Deanna seemed to be trying her best to ignore Ruby dancing with Sam, and staring up into Cas’ eyes, she pulled him close and led him off around the bar in an idiot’s parody of a waltz. When they attempted trying to spin her, they almost knocked into the regulars at the pool table.

Which was when Ellen went over to talk with Charlie, softly. “Hey,” she said, addressing all the dancers, off in their different directions. “What’s anyone think about going out tonight?”

Deanna let one arm loose from Cas’ chest, allowing Cas to realise how heavily he was breathing. If he could just get himself a drink of water…

“Ellen kicking us out?”

“In a nutshell, yeah.”

Deanna looked up at him, lips curving upwards seductively.

“Fancy a proper night out, cop?”

*

Cas wasn’t too sure who all had come with them. He wasn’t too sure of anything that happened after that. He remembered Ash and Andy singing Bon Jovi with their shirts off for some reason, he remembered a long line of more mysteriously colourful shots, remembered Ruby shaking her head derisively as Sam downed her shot for her after she refused to take it…

He remembered being on his way to the club and walking with Sam for a short way, explaining that he hadn’t drank in a long while, Sam trying to repeat similar phrases as Ash had earlier, about Deanna. He seemed mainly amused with the situation though.

He remembered being in the club, and beginning to dance awkwardly, and having Meg come up to him and try to dance with him. She was also very attractive. But she wasn’t Deanna, and moments later, Deanna had appeared, winding herself into his arms, and pushing Meg away in every way but the physical. _Mine,_ everything about her seemed to shout, as she pulled his head down to meet hers. Her lips tasted of the same alcohol he’d been indulging in himself all night, and it was all such a stupid idea, it was all such a wonderful idea...

She didn’t kiss like Daphne. She didn’t kiss like anyone. As Deanna Winchester slowly began to push her tongue into his mouth, he felt as though she was giving too much already somehow, too much of _herself._ It was almost frightening. But though he was a woefully bad dancer, Cas knew how to deal with this. Carefully, as though she was something delicate, he wound one hand tighter round her waist; the other up slowly through her hair. _When had she taken it down? Hadn’t it been up earlier?_

They stayed locked like that for a long time, their bodies beginning to move far more _together_ , as though here on this dancefloor they were one being, and not two near-strangers, with very separate lives and dancing abilities.

One of her hands had started to grip and squeeze down his back, further and further down…

“Nice ass, DiAngelo,” she told him into his ear.

And as he pulled her in tighter towards him, he groaned as she began kissing him again, this time with her teeth lingering on his lips as she pulled away. Meanwhile her free hand was moving, starting to stroke at the growing, stiffening bulge in his jeans between them. And then she started playing with the top of his underwear lining – such light teasing, but Cas could hardly bear it…

…And Cas remembered, just, walking her home…

Deanna’s room, Deanna’s bed… Cas barely noticed those. All his attention was stolen away by the woman in the bed beside him. Her mouth, her lips over his already dribbling cock… her hands everywhere… And he’d tried to pay attention to whatever it was she needed, she wanted, but she was all whirlwind energy, and demanded him inside of her _now_  and all he was suddenly capable of was obeying…

*

When Cas awoke at midday the following day, he was alone, and in his own bed. And he was left with a nagging certainty that _Ash had been right._

His head really was pounding.


	5. Moving on Up and Rambling On

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Deanna and Cas both suffer through hard mornings, and end the day talking things out with each other, in a one-sided drunken conversation on a bed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know this is later than I promised, but it's been a busy week... finally about to finish off the other fic and finish term to study at my own leisure (Ha. Hahahaha.) so I should actually start having time to update regularly soon - hooray for me :D

There was something about Lilith that never failed to set Deanna’s teeth on edge. Admittedly, it wasn’t often she found women who were as tall as she was, so that could have something to do with it. But Deanna had a feeling that it had more to do with the way she seemed just too damned composed all the time. She should be meaner, sloppier, more disorganised. Not standing around with her perfect blonde hair and expensive make-up, in her pretty, dark, designer suit.

Yeah, it was unnerving. One feeling Deanna didn’t need when she was hungover, had woken up alone, and was trying to have a one-on-one meeting with the woman fucking her sometimes-lover.

Just… what an awesome way to start off the day.

“So, Deanna, honey. Have you thought much about what I asked you the other night?”

Mostly Deanna hated the way Lilith pronounced her name. She made it sound like a question – not as though she was struggling to remember it, but like she was asking whether or not the name still fit the girl in front of her.

Trying not to grind her teeth together, Deanna smiled, thinly. “I’m happy to go front-line on things for a little while. I told you that, Lilith.”

For the millionth time, Deanna thought about asking Lilith where the name came from – if she’d picked it out herself perhaps in a throwback to the classic mythos. Deanna had loved reading that sorta stuff when she was about fifteen, sitting in the underused prison library. The librarian there, Missouri, she hadn’t put up with any of her bullshit. Not like everyone else had…

Lilith smiled. “I already put you down for it. What I’m asking you now, as I’m sure you’re aware, is whether or not you want to get in the work Alistair organises. It seems we’re… starting to look at a merger of sorts, here.” She blinked her long eyelashes, licking the lips that had probably been all over Bela last night… “I’d hate to see you get left behind, Deanna. You are of course, one of my best, or so I hear. Even if you are getting a little older…”

She was enjoying this, talking about what they did like it was some sort of rosy little business venture, Deanna realised. It was fucking irritating, and it reminded her that to date, Lilith was still the creepiest woman she’d ever met.

Alistair Folter was in his whole other little realm of creepy.

Deanna knew what getting ‘left behind’ meant. It meant being out of work, turning up at job agency after job agency and having them ask for jobs, or for your record of crime, if that’s all you’ve got to show for your life so far. Except this time, when all that failed, there’d be no good old Bela to fall back on for something. She’d have to stop paying rent to Bobby, and she could kiss goodbye forever to the anonymous tips to the cause. And everyone would know what a failure she’d turned out to be…

“Don’t worry. I’m game.”

Benny was going to kill her if he ever found out. Or, worse, he’d just stare at her with those stupid big Cajun eyes and say he was disappointed. Or threaten to tell Bobby…

“Fantastic. Come back tomorrow night – we’re briefing the whole group.” Lilith’s eyes sparkled disturbingly as she stood up. “It’ll be our own little party.”

Trying to pull her face out of the grimace she knew it was stuck in, Deanna exited the room. As she walked down the stairs of the dingy apartment block, she ran her hands up through her hair in frustration, just trying desperately to convince herself that this really was her only choice.

What else was she supposed to do? See if Burger King was interested in taking her? Ask that Castiel dude if she could sign on as some sort of junior detective? She almost laughed at the idea as she went out into the sunny daylight, out of Lilith’s crypt-like tower of influence for another while. Become the, likely underpaid, side-kick to a former cop, who’d seemed in such a hurry to leave her alone that night? It smacked of the sorta God-awful sit-com Garth liked to make people sit through with him.

Admittedly, Castiel probably had a hell of a lot of Dead-wife issues rattling around in his head – and hey, Deanna could relate to that. And yeah, it had been a while since she’d been with a guy, and she’d been pretty drunk herself… But it hadn’t gone all that badly, had it? Actually, she amended, frowning, she’d made sure he was pretty goddamned looked after. Why the big rush to leave her?

She shrugged to herself, and pulled her beat-up leather satchel back over her shoulder. It wasn’t really all that much of a shock, she supposed. In the end, everyone left.

*

Cas spent a lot of time in the shower that morning. The feeling of the hot water rolling over him was comforting, although the drumming of the water wasn’t helping sooth his aching head. Back home, years ago now, it was Daphne he’d always had to tease about taking long showers. In the early years of their marriage, the apartment they’d lived in didn’t have a working lock on any of its doors, and it had been an easy thing to force it open, and come in to join her, even when he’d just finished complaining that she was making him late for work _… And her eyes had looked even bigger with her hair sticking so close to her face…_

But he needed to stop romanticising. Those, after all, had been the early years.

Turning the shower off Cas risked a look in the mirror. The face staring back at him little resembled the man who’d left for a business meeting with his cousin, and yet it was painfully familiar. This was how he’d looked for almost a year after the accident, pale and sickly looking from the alcohol, a face that needed shaving and eyes that desperately needed some sleep.

Gripping his bathroom sink, he hardened his expression. Yes, people like Anna and Balthazar had been there to pick up the pieces and slap him back into sense back then. But ultimately it had been him, Castiel, who’d chosen to move his life on. He had been strong once, he could deal with a hangover.

But it wasn’t just the hangover bothering him. It was Deanna Winchester.

He couldn’t get her face out of his mind – the way she licked her lips, the way she flicked her eyes over him, her voice as she’d told him he was always going to be a cop… If only he could remember the rest a little more clearly…

Balthazar would be so happy, and so irritated. He’d spent so long determined to get Cas laid again, and Cas had gone and found someone for himself, in such a pathetically ridiculous manner. The one woman he really, really wasn’t supposed to have even looked at that way had just become the first woman he’d slept with since his wife.

He groaned, and buried his face into his towel as he left the room. Maybe he should just tell Naomi that he couldn’t do this… But dammit. Now there was Bobby, and the rest of them, that he’d genuinely like to help, a group he really would like to get involved in. And he needed the money. Breathing steadily, Cas told himself to calm until he could talk to Anna. Anna would know what to do.

Cas tried putting on the jeans he’d been wearing the night before, but was quickly forced to start rummaging for his older, tighter pair. These ones were sticky with some sort of… he sniffed them. Well, alcohol, anyway. Before he tossed them into his wash-basket, he retrieved his phone from his pocket, and found that he had a message from Bobby, seven messages and a missed call from Anna, and a missed call from his landlady, Hester.

His heart sank as he started calling Hester back. With all the noises she’d been making for months, this couldn’t be good…

*

“Deanna!”

Deanna groaned and ignored the knocking at her door by pointedly continuing to watch the new _Game of Thrones_ trailer on her laptop. It was looking awesome so far, although, not enough Sansa, still. Or Bronn. She liked him. He seemed to be one of the ones that got shit done.

“Deanna! _Dean!_ ”

Groaning, Deanna closed the laptop and rolled herself off her bed – reminding herself that she’d probably need to wash those sheets – and walked across her room to open the door for her angry giant of a brother.

“You run out of salad or something, Sammy?”

He turned the ultimate Bitchface on her as she grinned up at him. “You stole my i-pod again, Dean, I know it.”

She rolled her eyes and laughed. “You know I can’t stand those things, Sam…”

“I also know that you _say_ that - and then you steal it to go to and from work.”

“Not this time. It was only a meeting.”

Sam laughed and stepped through the doorway. “What kind of a meeting do you need to be going to for a PR gig?”

She narrowed her eyes and shoved him. “Excuse me, pretty college boy. Have you ever worked PR before? No? Then shut up.”

“Alright, ok. Now hand over the i-pod.”

“I told you, I don’t have it, alright?”

She raised her hands in mock surrender and turned away. _Dammit_ she needed that i-pod, to calm her down before she left to work the next day. And Sam wasn’t going to go giving it back so soon if she handed it over now. He could get a little touchy about his tech. Well. A lot touchy. She hoped for his roommates’ sakes that they weren’t the types to try fraping him…

“Deanna, Ash says he _saw_ you come through and “borrow” it!”

“Ash lies.”

_Fuck Ash._

“Maybe if you don’t give it back,” Sam jibed, “then I’ll steal your phone and start texting Bobby’s friend Castiel about how much you’ve been _missing him_ since last night.”

Deanna crossed her arms and smiled at him. “As if you could steal my phone.”

“Was that an admission of guilt?”

“ _No._ Just doubting you’re as good as you think you are.”

Sam started to slowly lift her beat-up flip-phone out from his pocket. Deanna snarled. Sam couldn’t see the inside of that phone. There were hundreds of messages from Lilith on there…

“Give it here, Sam,” she ordered, opening her palm.

He laughed at her, and placed a hand to his chest, all sweet falsity. “Oh, how the tables _turn…_ ”

“ _Sam…_ ”

“Where’s my i-pod?”

“I _told_ you, I don’t have it.”

“I think I’ll start the message with – ‘ _Heavenly_ Castiel, without you in my life, my bed is cold, my heart has shrivelled, and I am left feeling inferior to my handsome younger brother…”

“ _SAM.”_

“…who is so much more intelligent than…”

…And Deanna kinda lost it.

Ten minutes later they were forcing themselves into Bobby’s kitchen, still tearing at each other’s hair and laughing only rarely – because this was a serious fight.

“ _Bobby!_ This fucker’s violating my privacy! Again!”

“There’s justifiable reasons for it!”

“That’s what they say about Guantanamo, bitch, now gimme the phone back.”

Bobby appeared from the other room, holding his ear to his cell-phone, a familiar look of exasperation creasing his face. “Would you idjits stop acting like spoilt brats for a few seconds? Grown-ups are trying to have a conversation, thank you.”

Sulkily, the Winchesters released one another, and listened to Bobby continue his phone call.

“…So, Cas-”

_Fuck everything._

“…You’re saying she has the legal right to do this to you? You’re _sure_?” Bobby rubbed his forehead wearily. “Well I mean, cash-in-hand deals are always bad news but… Yeah, I get it. The job’s always got to come first when it comes down to it… _No_ , Cas, you’re not gonna sleep on your friend’s couch, alright? Don’t be ridiculous. We’ve got plenty of room around here, especially with Sam moving out - you can have Rufus' old place…” Bobby growled at whatever Cas replied with. “Don’t be so damn _proud_ , y’idjit. It can just be while you’re getting back on your feet. And you won’t need to pay me much rent, not if I’m getting another live-in campaign worker out of this… Yeah. Yeah I mean it. Now you can get your ass over here later today. I’m sure Anna’d tell you the same. She always was the more practical of the two of you…”

As Bobby started to break-up his bullying with reminiscences, Deanna stepped away from Sam and sat down at the table, wondering vaguely who this Anna could be. Sam silently started laughing at her, before frowning when she didn’t look up. _You want me to punch this guy?_ he mouthed at her, and she rolled her eyes, but she smiled. The thought of Sam protecting her was always amusing, and against a sweet thing like Castiel… It was a ridiculous image. Especially when she was supposed to be the one hurting and protecting everyone.

Bobby came off the phone and sighed. “So I called Cas asking how he felt about officially signing up with us now that he’s met everyone,” Bobby continued as he sat down at the table, “and he had to tell me he was a bit too tied up to talk, because he needed to go and find someplace new to live.”

Sam frowned and sat down with them. “What’s happened, Bobby?”

“He and his partner Anna…”

_Partner. Detective partner?_

“… they rent their office for the work they do in the same building Cas lives in. Basically, they carried out all these weird transactions to get both spaces, although technically, one of them’s not officially being rented…”

“And now I’m guessing she needs the space, and either Cas or the office goes.”

Bobby nodded grimly at Deanna. “You got it.”

“That’s… a shit time for him then, I guess.” _And for me. Wow, this could be awkward…_

“Well, I ordered him here. Can’t have him sleeping on couches. So,” Bobby added, starting to smile. “What were you two screaming about anyway?”

*

Cas felt as though he was going to drown in Bobby Singer’s kindness. This man he was practically spying on was letting him stay in what, really, was part of his own home, and almost for free. Not even his family – well, certainly not his family - would have done something this kind all for him, although Anna might have. And the place was nice, Cas thought again, appraisingly, as he looked around his new apartment. High ceilings, fully furnished, warm décor… And only a few doors down from where Deanna Winchester lived.

He sighed and slumped down on his new bed. She hadn’t been around the entire time he’d been moving his things in. Sam had been there though, and had helped bring all his boxes up for him. Cas couldn’t help being a little jealous, watching how much the younger man was able to carry. Even in his early days on the force, Cas would never have been able to hold up that much.

“You don’t own all that much, do you Cas?” Sam had asked and Cas had shrugged, smiling. He’d never really seen the need for clutter. He had what he needed, and a few things he’d just liked. And now they all seemed to fit so well into this new home, much nicer than his last. He would stay here, if he could, he realised. This could have been home. It was right in town, and close to his office. But thanks to Naomi, things were probably going to have to be more complicated than that. He dragged his hands over his face. What was Bobby going to think of him after he found out about all this?

What was _Deanna_ going to think of him?

Well, he thought, as he lay back on the bed, loosening his top shirt buttons. At least he was in a solid position now to start working out what he should tell the Winchesters about their Uncle’s strange offer, and how much he should start revealing to Naomi. He put his hands over his eyes again. He felt… strangely protective of both Winchesters already. He didn’t want to have to tell someone that the even-tempered cheerful law student was also potentially involved with some interesting anarchist characters. And he didn’t want to have to tell them about how he suspected Deanna, the woman who had made him actually get up and dance for the first time in so many years, made her living…

Cas had almost fallen asleep, fully clothed, when the knocking at his door startled him. “Just coming,” he called out, and went over to answer it. It was probably Bobby. It was odd, he thought, as he turned the door handle, thinking of his landlord as a friend. Hester had certainly never left herself open to that…

But it wasn’t Bobby at the door.

“Heya, Cassie.”

Deanna was leaning against his doorframe, her hair all undone and draping down past her shoulders, and she was carrying an almost-emptied bottle of Jack Daniels in one hand. Cas suspected it was the reason her lovely green eyes looked almost glazed now, and heavily diluted. She smiled and leaned forwards, finger outstretched. “I like what you’ve done with your shirt there. It looks cool.”

Her words didn’t sound _too_ slurred, Cas thought hopefully, but then she leaned forward as though she was trying to walk into the room, but had forgotten that her legs would need to move first for that. “Whoah, I got you,” Cas muttered, as her head leaned on his chest. Her hair smelt tangy, fruity.

So much for keeping things business-like.

“Ok, why don’t you come in and have a sit down, ok Deanna? Dean?”

She glared at him suspiciously, and broke half-heartedly from his grip. “Sammy’s th’only one who calls me that. And leave off – I’m not a little kid, and I’m, I’m not drunk,” she stated solemnly, flopping down onto his bed.

“If I had a dime for every time somebody’s told me that I arrested for driving under the influence,” Cas muttered, smiling weakly as he sat down, a little tentatively, beside her. Trying his best not to think about the last time they were both on a bed together…

She laughed, licking her lips a little. “You’re such a… such a straitlaced cop type. You’re actually a walking stereotype, dude, y’know that?”

“I wasn’t aware, no.”

She held out a hand, ready to start counting fingers. “Right. You probably always wanted to be a cop, right?”

“Well. There was the time I wanted to run off and be a beekeeper.”

Deanna looked as though she were trying to hold in a laugh, before she gave up, and exploded, giving him a rather painful punch on the shoulder as she did so.

“Right. Ok. Beekeeper. Bzzzzzzzzzzzz.” She started laughing again. “Alright. Right. But then you have tragedy and you get all cynical and sad, and get out OF THE SYSTEM. Right?”

Cas smiled slightly. “Hmm. Just about, I suppose.”

“I should have been a psychologist or something. But they probably don’t let people like me go talking to people who want to pay to have their heads examined. Cause it’s dark enough already in here, y’know?” She tapped at her head, before finishing the rest of the bottle in one quick swig.

“You didn’t… want to dilute any of that?” Cas asked as she threw the bottle down on his new floor. She shook her head. “Nah. I learned to drink like my old man. Well I mean, there’s _social_ drinking, and then there’s _drinking_ , and you aren’t gonna go sweetening it up when it’s just for you, now are you?” The way she looked at him made him think that the amateur ‘psychologist’ might just have figured him out a little more fully than her first slurred summary suggested.

“Deanna, you should maybe get some rest, get to bed…”

She winked. “But I am in bed.”

“Um,” he cleared his throat. “Do you need to talk about why you were drinking?”

“Nope. But you,” she continued, pointing a finger at him, “You’re part of the problem. Ok, don’t look so fucking worried, alright? Mostly it’s just that… I don’t want my brother to leave, but I don’t want to say that, or I’ll just end up looking like the clingy, trashy bit of family dragging him down.”

“No one would ever-”

She cut him off sharply. “They already do, Cas. I know. So I know that it’s best for him to leave, it just… it just hurts like a bitch is all.” She flopped back on the bed, and when she closed her eyes she looked so peaceful Cas almost wondered if she’d fallen asleep.

“You’re always thinking about helping your brother, aren’t you?”

“Right from the start.”

“What constitutes the start?”

She opened one eye, smiling. “Now who’s psychobullshitting?” She smirked when he did nothing but blink, quietly waiting for an answer. “Alright Dr Phil, I’ll bite. It was the fire that did it.”

“The fire?”

“That killed our Mom. I was four. Dad got me to carry Sam outside, and Hell, all the little girls love playing with dolls, right? But Sammy, he wasn’t a doll, he was warm and real and he needed me, and Dad needed me to look after him. And… I needed him to need me, that’s how I got through Dad too, I think.” She suddenly sent a hand flying to slap her forehead like a hammer at a fairground strength challenge. “And you really don’t need all this chick flick shit from me, do you?” She laughed, self-deprecatingly this time.

“I’m listening, Deanna.”

“I’m listening, Deanna,” she mimicked, giggling again.

He smiled down at her. He was still worried about her feeling sick after all this alcohol she’d forced into her body, but he couldn’t help feeling lucky somehow, seeing this side of Deanna. She seemed almost soft, vulnerable – there wasn’t the same edge over her words. Still with her eyes closed, her face turned a little more sad. “So. You wanna know about the night I shot him, right?”

“Deanna-”

She waved a hand dismissively. “S’alright, everyone does. But you asked me _why_ last night. People don’t do that, not too often. They think I just went crazy and think – hey, that’s a messy one to bring up, right?”

“I don’t think you went crazy, Deanna.”

“Thanks for the support, detective. Well I didn’t go crazy. I’d do it all again if I had to.” She seemed to think for a moment. “Nah,” she decided eventually, “wouldn’t change a thing.”

“Why did you shoot him then?”

“Because he was a fucking pervert.”

Cas had to close his eyes as well as he felt his blood run cold. All he could hear was Naomi’s voice in his head, repeating what a ‘charming’ man she’d thought this Devas brother... Had she known? Did they all know?

No wonder Deanna wanted nothing to do with the Devases.

“Did he… did he touch you?”

At the hardness of his voice, Deanna opened her eyes and smiled a little. “Me? Nah I was too old for that one.”

Cas breathed out in relief.

“Nah, Sammy was more his taste.”

“ _You’re always thinking about helping your brother, aren’t you?”_

“Deanna…”

“I know. My life sucks, right?”

He placed his hand over hers, lightly. “I’m not sure I’ve ever met a person so brave.”

She snorted, but the delayed reaction left him hoping that she’d taken to heart something of what he’d said. “I’m sorry, haven't you heard me whining? And I haven’t even got started on this rant… Because you lost your home today and I just basically got promoted, and that’s mainly all I want to complain about, really.”

Cas stiffened. Her job… “Bobby mentioned you work in sales.”

“Yup.”

Cas bit his lip. Did he really want to go here and drag up _everything_ now when she was drunk?

“It’s just… I heard you speaking to Benny the other day, through the door. And… Deanna, I was a cop - I know Alistair Folter isn’t known for his sales work.”

She sat up, and the focus of her eyes on him again was nearly blinding. “Oh yeah? Maybe it’s a different guy.”

Cas sighed, looking at her apologetically. “Deanna, _please_ , this isn’t your only option.”

She snorted. “You reading off the same script Benny got? Tell me Castiel, how do you know? Ever walked a mile in my shoes before?”

Wobbling slightly, she got up and stood in front of him. “See, even if I do find those other jobs, people don’t look at me right. They don’t look at me the same way. And neither can I. Hell, I know I’m always going to be a freak. I’d rather work with the rest of the freaks, thanks.”

She crossed her arms. “So. You gonna report me now? Cop?”

Cas was flustered. “No, of course not.”

She sat back down again beside him and snorted again. “Cops always tell me that.”

“What does that mean?”

A finger wag was his only response. “Oh no, detective. That’s as much as you’re getting outta me tonight.”

“But you haven’t told me why it’s my fault you were drinking yet.”

She shrugged. “I guess I haven’t yet. Nah, it’s just that I just don’t get it. Why’d you leave this morning so fast?”

Cas hesitated, aware that his face was probably turning a little red. “I – I don’t really remember all that much after a certain point last night, I’m sorry.”

“…I mean, I couldn’t have been that bad, right? But I swear, you were barely enjoying yourself at all.”

“How… ungrateful of me.”

She laughed. “But seriously. I haven’t been with a guy in a while. But I’m pretty sure I was giving you everything you needed last night.”

Cas opened his mouth awkwardly. Her face seemed practical, amused even about the situation, but her eyes still looked worried. “I think… I think that might have been something making me uncomfortable. I felt as though…”

Cas cringed inwardly as he tried to imagine saying any of this to a sober Deanna.

“…almost as though you were giving too much, and I was giving you nothing in return.”

She smiled, and tilted her head to one side. “You’re something, y’know that?" Laying one hand down on his lap, she looked up into his eyes again. “Do you want to show me what you mean by that then?”

Cas nearly groaned, despite himself. Her hand was so _close_ to where his body felt he needed it, and there was that gorgeous mouth of hers, just hovering around him, waiting. Oh, he wanted to show her. He wanted to make this woman feel accepted, feel cared for, feel loved, to make her _understand._ And he wanted her hands all over him, but most of all he wanted to hear what she sounded like when he made her moan out in pleasure, in surrender…

As he placed a hand on her shoulder, she took it for a go-ahead, and leaned in. But he lightly pushed her back. “No, Dean,” he said softly. “This isn’t what you need right now. Right now you need to get some sleep.”

She pouted like a child. “But I’m not sleepy,” she protested as he encouraged her to lie down on the bed, to get her head on the pillow.

“Well alright,” she muttered, “But you owe me some of this hotter sex another time, alright?”

“Go to sleep Deanna.”

“Fine. Bossy.”

And almost immediately, sprawled out all across Cas’ double bed, she began to snore softly.

Which was how Cas ended up sleeping on his couch, the first night in his new apartment.

*

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Ok, the part with Hester might be stretching things a little bit/is deliberately vague. But. Plot required it. So it happened.


	6. Pancakes and Champagne

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cas gets given food and alcohol, and Deanna gets bossed about.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this is a bit of a short one...

Deanna had just finished making up the first batch of pancakes when Cas woke up and found his way into his new kitchen. “I figured I probably owed you breakfast,” she muttered, shrugging as she waved her spatula around. “D’you want it with syrup?”

He blinked at her sleepily, his bedhead looking absolutely adorable. And smoking hot.

“…I didn’t have any food in yet…”

“Yeah, dude, what’s with the bare cupboards? I had to go swipe all this off Sam.”

Cas ran a hand up through his hair. He’d slept in a long baggy plain dark t-shirt and some seriously short blue shorts. When Deanna had woken up and found him on the couch, looing uncomfortable as he curled himself up under his trenchcoat, she’d had to spend a few minutes staring at him. Mostly to regain her bearings, to remember where she was, why he was here with her, and what had happened, but also because there’d been something endearingly unhappy about his face. Hence the pancakes. She was a bit of a sucker for strays.

“I should… bring him up something in return.”

“Leave it. He won’t even notice – he leaves tomorrow, and Ash doesn’t really eat.” She smiled as she put down the plateful of stacked pancakes in front of him. “And I figured you’d want syrup. Everyone wants syrup.”

As she turned back to the side to pick up her own, slightly more modest, share of pancakes, she heard him ask, “How are you feeling today, Deanna?”

She placed her plate down with a bit of a clatter and sat down across from him and shrugged. “Alright. I bounce. How bad was I last night?” She cringed at her own words. She’d been such a dumbass. But everything had finally started to get to her… and Cas had been right there beneath her. It had seemed such a good idea, going down to see him, a way to solve at least one of her problems. And it got a little fuzzy after that…

Cas cleared his throat awkwardly and seemed to become fascinated with the pancakes he was pushing around his plate with his fork. She felt a little sorry for him. He’d really only just met the woman in front of him and so far basically he’d only heard her whine about her problems and slept with her. Probably not such a great couple of days for an awkward little soul like him.

“You were just a little inebriated. It was only me, in any case. These pancakes really are wonderful.”

She bit down on her lip to stop herself grinning. Her cooking was finally starting to get better. And that was pretty cool. “I didn’t say anything too bad did I? And sorry for stealing your bed, man. You shoulda probably just kicked me out.”

Cas smiled at her, his mouth full. “That wouldn’t have seemed entirely chivalrous… You were a little upset.”

Deanna felt her stomach drop. “Upset?”

“Mmm.”

“What was I saying?”

“Oh, several things. Sam moving out. And… you were talking why you shot your uncle.”

Deanna gripped tightly at her fork.  “Was I?” she asked eventually. “Well that’s just… awesome.”

Cas looked up from his pancakes again, concerned. “It didn’t seem to upset you too badly.”

“No, it doesn’t. It’s just a…” she waved her fork around, almost managing to get syrup on her jeans, “thing that happened, really. I’m over it.”

“Right.”

They were quiet for a minute, the radio she’d turned on blasting the only noise in the room apart from the clinking of their cutlery on the plates. Deanna didn’t want to think about whatever it was she’d told him – but it freaked her out not knowing. There was only a very, very small group of people who really knew anything about the whole thing. And she wasn’t sure yet about how she felt with this guy being one of them. Even if he did like her pancakes.

“It certainly helped me better understand why you and your brother have shown no interest in connecting with your father’s family.” His blue eyes locked on hers, sympathetically. And they really were _blue._ “It doesn’t sound as though they were there for you at a time when you needed them.”

She snorted, and took another large bite of her pancakes. “You could say that. You know where Lucius Devas is now? He’s holed up in a penthouse on the other side of town, chilling on his big brother’s money.” She noticed him looking uncomfortable and forced him to meet her eyes again. “And the rest of them have never even said hello. I think there were three brothers… I’m not sure. If we ever do manage to put some kind of spanner in their works I’d be happy to see any and all of them fall down for it.” She shrugged. Experience had taught her not to think too much in terms of revenge. It wasn’t going to get her anywhere fast.

“So you got any brothers, sisters, whatever?”

She was aware she was speaking with her mouth full, but figured Cas had seen enough of her at her worst not to care.

He nodded. “One half-brother, Raphael.”

“He’s not a giant green turtle is he?”

Cas looked so bewildered Deanna almost choked on her food. “A teenage mutant… aw never mind.”

“I believe his father named him for the Renaissance painter.”

 “Right.” She bit down on her lip to stop herself smiling. “So you guys aren’t close then?”

“Not really, no. It’s certainly nothing like your relationship with Sam.”

She had to smile for that. “Yeah, Ellen brought him up well I guess.”

“Who is it he’s moving in with tomorrow? Is it his girlfriend?”

“Ruby?  No, thank fuck.”

He smiled slightly. “You really don’t seem to like her much.”

“You think, Sherlock?”

He shrugged. “She’s only young, Deanna. She can’t be more than…”

“She’s twenty-two,” Deanna snapped. “And let’s just say I know something about young girls.” She smiled thinly as she stood up with her plate. “Doesn’t pay to underestimate them. Believe me when I say, they’re the worst.”

She had to pause for a moment, remembering a girl with red hair, her nose broken…

“Yeah. Sam deserves better.”

She shoved her plate into the sink, before turning back to Cas with a smile. It was kinda nice, hanging out in a hot guy’s apartment, cooking him breakfast. It was… different.

As Cas finished up the last of his pancakes he looked up. “So are you working today?”

She couldn’t actually remember telling him… but she could hear it in his voice, laced in there. He _knew._ She shrugged and turned back to the dishes, for now hoping that she was wrong. “I’ve got another meeting tonight. Company’s reshuffling a bit.”

“Deanna. I… I know about Folter.”

She closed her eyes, drawing in a long breath. “Oh yeah?”

“I know I can’t tell you to stop what you’re doing…”

Her fingers gripped at the kitchen side tightly. “Nope.”

“…And I’m not going to tell anyone. I just… Deanna, I don’t know exactly what it is you’re doing now, but if Alistair Folter’s involved then it’s got worse. I know if Bobby knew…”

She sat down again. “Look, Castiel. You seem like a good guy, alright? But if you try and tell my family something, anything about this?” She leant forward towards him, face blank and lips pursed tightly. “You’re not going to have somewhere to live much longer. You get me?”

“Deanna, I’m not trying to blackmail you-”

She stood up and smiled. “That makes one of us then. Glad you liked your pancakes, dude.”

*

Cas was late coming back into the office, which had apparently given Anna enough time to bake him a cake in the office kitchen. It was a little burnt, but she’d covered it up with a lot of blue icing. Emblazoned on its top was the legend: _Thanks for going homeless_ _and saving the_ _office._

Apparently she’d started to run out of space somewhere along the way. It wasn’t surprising – she always had been an optimist.

“What is it about beautiful women making me food today?” he asked her after she pulled him in for an enthusiastic hug. “You deserve it all and more, Castiel – you are such a big hero - I don’t know what we’d have done… And I didn’t actually bake that, it was Inias when he came in this morning. I just sort of… commissioned it.”

“Ah. You are a true slave-driver, Anna.”

“So… who was beautiful woman number one? What the Hell have you been up to this weekend? I thought you were working on that weirdo case for your cousin, or aunt or whatever…” She’d perched herself neatly on his desk, so that when he sat down to turn on his computer she was well-positioned to, for once, intimidate him through height. Cas nodded, and tried to ignore her smile. “I was working.”

“Beautiful woman was just part of the case then?”

“…Yes.”

“And I thought this was you moved into your new apartment – and where did you even find a place at such late notice?”

“Mmm. Yes.”

“ _Cas,”_ she hissed, as she aimed her swinging feet towards his chair. “You’ve gotta give me something here.”

“I’m afraid you wouldn’t approve.”

“I can be crazy. I can be cool. Hit me.”

Sighing, Cas swung around on his chair to look up at his interrogator. “You remember Bobby Singer, yes?”

When she’d gotten the whole weekend out of him, all she was able to do for a minute was shake her head. “DiAngelo, sometimes I think you might be the unluckiest idiot I’ve ever met. So, your objective’s pretty unclear, but you’re not so sure if it’s moral now you know just how bad the people paying you might be, and so far you’ve found both your marks, you’re living with them both and you’ve slept with one of them. I miss anything out?”

Well. He’d refrained from telling her about how he suspected Deanna earned her living. It really did add an entirely new level of complicated to the situation. “That’s… yes that’s it.”

“Cas, you need to find some new lodgings. Bobby’s not going to like it when he finds out why you came back to see him in the first place. And you need to talk to your aunt. This is getting awkward for you, and you’ve found them now…” She thought for a moment. “Maybe speak to her husband. I mean, are they even on the same page about this? They’re _his_ family, right?”

“Well yes, I suppose…” He sighed. “I should arrange to meet them again. I just still don’t understand _why_ _now_ when he could have looked for them years ago – and they really weren’t difficult to find, Anna.”

She smiled down at him fondly as she got off of her perch. “We’re detectives, Cas. It’s our job to figure it out. Even the stuff they don’t want us to. You want a coffee?”

“Sure.”

She put the kettle on to boil, and leant against the kitchen counter, frowning now. “Cas, I don’t want to bring things up that aren’t there…”

“Mmm?” Cas had a suspicion he knew what this might be about.

“…but Daphne’s birthday this week. You hadn’t thought about it at all, had you…?”

Cas forced his face to keep the same neutral expression, when really it was like a punch to the gut. Really, he’d actually almost forgotten this year, and now the guilt was back, and eating at him again… “No, Anna, I hadn’t.”

Her face relaxed in obvious relief. “Good. It’s just, she was my best friend, and if you need someone around to remember her with, then you know I am only ever a call away.” Her nervous smile didn’t manage to mask what she wasn’t saying. _Don’t make me find you like last year, Cas._

But the truth was, Anna really was the last person he wanted to remember Daphne with, simply because she had been so close to her. She’d been the one to introduce them in the first place… He’d tried so hard to keep the cracks in his marriage from showing to Anna, to his partner, along with everyone else. And they’d been doing so well – or so badly, depending on how you looked at it – right up until the end… No. Anna couldn’t know. But he shouldn’t need her this year, he’d grown, and grown stronger – this year he would be fine on his own.

The afternoon passed by in relative calm after that, and neither of them brought up the subject again. However Anna did continue nagging at him to try and find somewhere else to live, but Cas felt curiously reluctant to start the search. The truth was that he _liked_ it at Bobby’s, much more than he had the place above the office. And it didn’t hurt his case that Deanna was right there on sight to keep an eye on – and Sam as well, of course. Cas genuinely was interested in what Sam was getting up to…

They’d had three phone-calls and no visits when the doorbell rang up for the first time that day at five-thirty. Anna shrugged innocently and let Cas get up for it, Cas squinting suspiciously at her. Sure enough, when their ‘client’ walked through the door he was familiar enough.

“Balthazar.”

Balthazar raised an eyebrow at him, and plunged his hands confidently into his suit pockets. “Cassie. Missed you at my birthday party the other night.”

“I apologise, I was very busy that night.”

“Oh yes, Anna’s told me.”

Anna smiled at him when Cas turned round to stare at her accusatively. “I _said_ I wouldn’t cover for you.”

A smile tugged at Balthazar’s lips. “What do you say, Cas? Fancy getting out of this midden-”

Anna pursed her lips. “Hey!”

“-a little early and getting a drink with your dearest friend?”

Cas sat back down at his desk. “I’m sorry, Balthazar, but I really do have a lot of work to get through right now…” A hand slammed down on his desk, interrupting him.

“Cassie. You always have a lot of work to get through.”

“It’s a Monday night,” Cas growled.

“One drink, Cas, for Christ’s sake live a little!”

“…and Anna’s going to need me around…”

“Not even a little,” she called over to them cheerfully.

Cas huffed. He supposed he had been neglecting Balthazar again recently. He’d never really been so good at keeping in touch with people, but he’d once been much better at accepting invites from them, which had balanced things out better.

“One drink.”

*

“One drink” apparently constituted starting with one shared bottle of Champagne to split between them both. The place Balthazar had taken him along to was, predictably, _snazzy,_ in lieu of a better word, but he’d apparently compromised with what he knew of Cas’ bank balance and sensibilities, and had also made it a familiar, relatively inexpensive place in the centre of time. There’s been a lot of nights out here with his friends on the force, Cas remembered, as he looked around him.

“So the peach fuzz has returned,” Balthazar noted as they took their seats down in a booth. “I hope nothing’s the matter with you…”

“What? No, I’ve just been a little busy this weekend.”

“Mmm, I hear. New apartment?”

“Yes.”

“And you were out drinking without me?”

“How did Anna tell you already-”

Balthazar waved a hand dismissively. “She didn’t need to tell me. You look as though you might have finally been doing someone with yourself.” He narrowed his eyes, smiling at Cas. “… and possibly with someone else as well… Man or woman? Or is it plural?”

Cas frowned at him as he took a swig from his wine. Balthazar usually knew better than to bring up touchy subjects like that. “Yes, I was out.”

“…and having sex.”

Cas rolled his eyes up to face the ceiling. “Yes, Balthazar. Having sex. With a woman.”

“Only one?”

Cas shot him an unamused look.

“Ok, this is good, this is progress – I’m happy for you! It deserves another bottle of champagne…”

“Balthazar…”

“What! This _is_ your first since Daphne, am I right?”

“… Not that it’s _any_ of your business…”

“…And what a desert of a dry spell it’s been, you’ve been such a godforsaken _martyr_ about things…”

Cas put his drink down in an attempt to stop himself smashing it from gripping it too tightly. “Balthazar…”

“No, I’m sorry Cas, but someone needs to say this. We all pussyfoot around about you and let you fall off the grid as you constantly attempt to punish yourself for something which _wasn’t your fault_.”

 _And how would you know?_ Cas almost asked him, but stopped himself. He didn’t want to have to keep talking about this for longer than he had to. “Well. I suppose I’m back on the grid now.”

Balthazar smiled, still looking a little worried. “That’s the idea, Cassie. So are you going to see this girl again?”

Cas abandoned his original plan not to drink much and poured another glass for himself. “I have to. I live below her. And I have to see her for… work.”

“You sly bastard. Are you investigating her?”

Sometimes, Balthazar really was just too perceptive. It had been Balthazar, back in college, who’d first noticed that Cas took an interest in looking at men along with women. He was the sort of person who noticed the small things.

“Well…” But Cas was saved from answering as he noticed a familiar face pass by their booth towards the bar. “Can you… can you hang on a moment?” he asked as he stood up, and went after the man he’d just seen walk over to the bar.

“Uriel?”

The other man turned around with a beaming smile on his face and pulled Cas into tight hug. “Castiel! It’s been a long time! What are you doing with yourself these days?”

“Well, at the moment, drinking,” Cas said, gesturing around him, “But I work as a PI now with Anna, Anna Milton.”

“You’re freelancing as a detective?” Uriel whistled, only the slight hint of mockery glinting in his eyes. “That sounds more adventurous than what I’ve been up to, I’m mostly on desk-work these days…”

“Oh really?” Cas asked as he took a seat down on a bar stool beside Uriel, trying to ignore the other cops he could see in Uriel’s group. He’d liked Uriel, but this was starting to feel like a bad idea. When he’d left the force, he’d sort of… slid of the map a little. He’d not really been in the right place for a long time after leaving to continue attending any social events, and he’d never felt all that close to many of his fellow cops. He’d always been too much of an oddball really.

“Yes, less exciting but it has its perks.” He smiled. “For instance, it means I get to enjoy a drink this evening instead of going on this raid tonight.” He shuddered, laughing. “It’s far too cold.”

“A raid? What’s going on?”

Uriel waved a hand. “Oh. We got a tip-off about something Alistair Folter was up to.” He raised his wine glass. “You never know, tonight might finally be the time we catch him. I’m just glad it’s not me out there, I’m getting too old for all of that. Let the young lot go and put themselves on the line.”

Cas steadied his breathing, his brain screaming out a steady rhythm of _DeannaDeannaDeanna…_

“So. Are you working on any cases yourself at the moment? Castiel?”

*

“…I wouldn’t even know _how_ to look after a dog.”

“You used to look after me alright.”

“You were a simpler creature, Sammy.”

Deanna huffed and stared down at Sam’s big lump of a dog again, who looked back and started thumping his tail lightly.

Dammit, she didn’t even like dogs.

“And you’re _sure_ the landlord wouldn’t just let you keep him.”

Sam’s face twitched awkwardly, his own puppy-dog eyes blazing with full force. She groaned aloud. She’d always been a sucker for him looking at her like that.

“Fine! I’ll take your douchey dog.”

A grin split wide over Sam’s face as he went in to hug her. “Thanks, Dean, you’re the best!” Arms pinned to her side, she continued grumbling. “But you still have to come over and walk him and stuff. I don’t want to have to pick up shit any more than I have to.”

“Sure. Done.”

“And if he tries chewing at any of my vinyls he’s out.”

“He won’t,” Sam asserted confidently as he pulled away to pat the dog’s head, who’d been getting steadily more excited with all the hugging going on. “Khan’s trained now.”

“Trained. Right, sure. And he doesn’t get any rides in my car.”

Sam bit his lip. “Actually…  Could you maybe give me a hand with moving all my stuff tomorrow? I could really use the Impala…”

She threw up her arms in surrender, trying to ignore the finality of his words. _Tomorrow._ “Sure. Whatever.”

He spent another few minutes jabbering on about being grateful before he and his smelly dog eventually left her room. Deanna collapsed on her bed. She just felt so damn _tired_ all the time now. Usually, on finding out they had an anonymous benefactor for the protest coming up, she’d be excited – interested, curious at the very least, like everyone else. But now it was hard even just bringing herself to care at all. All she’d been able to think about all day was the meeting that evening. She was finally going to be properly introduced to this Alistair.

It wasn’t like she was an angel in what she did currently. It just felt like she’d sleepwalked into all that, and that if she kept moving forward she’d be well, choosing what she was. That it was finally going to be all her fault. And they all kept telling her how she had other choices. She just couldn’t see them right now. Hadn’t experience taught her that this was all she was good for?

When she heard the knocking at her door start, she felt like screaming at whoever it was to fuck off. But instead she just glared at the door, sighing loudly.

“Door’s open.”

She’d been expecting Bobby or Ash or someone. Not Castiel, looking like he’d just ran all the way to her door.

“Deanna.” He took a long draw for breath and she had to smile.

“What’s got you all in a panic?”

“You… you can’t go to work tonight, Deanna.”

She stood up and crossed her arms. _Fucking Cops._ “Why the Hell not?”

“Because…” He was still panting for breath. “Because the cops are going to be there. There’s going to be a raid.”

She paused. Bela was there already… “If you’re lying to me I sweartoGod, Cas…”

“I’m not, I promise. I met the officer involved – I heard it from him.”

She turned back to her bed and started fumbling around the covers, trying to remember where she’d left her phone. “I have to warn them, I have to do something… Fuck, how do I tell them without sounding like some sort of spy?” She turned to look at him. “What the Hell am I supposed to do with this information?”

“Um. Don’t go. Don’t get arrested.”

“That’s not good enough for everyone already there, is it?” she snapped at him.

He stepped forward, face all slack with concern. “You can’t save everyone…”

“Well I can go and give it a goddamn try!”

She picked up her phone and started calling Bela, but it went straight to her smooth, snarky voicemail. “Godfucking _dammit_ Bela!”

She called Lilith, and got only an endless dialling tone.

She called Cassie, she called Sarah, she called Madison. Nobody was picking up their phone.

Now in a rage, Deanna threw her phone down on the bed. So this is what she got for being late to meetings… “I have to go and tell them.”

He moved over to her and gripped at her arms. “No, Deanna. I told you this so that _you_ wouldn’t get arrested – not that you could charge right into the fire.”

“I can’t just leave them like that – you think I’m some cold, heartless bitch who doesn’t care about her friends? Because I care, Cas. It actually fucking matters to me what happens to them.”

“I know you care, Deanna,” he said softly, his face so close to hers, his lips open, his eyes searching. “You care more than anyone I’ve ever met. But more than anyone you deserve to be cared for.”

She wanted to melt there, held up by his arms, staring into his big pools of eyes.

“Let me care, Dean. Let _someone_ care.”

She gritted her teeth together. “Get your hands off of me.”

Obligingly he let go of her.

“Now get the Hell out of my room.”

“I’ll leave, if you promise me that you won’t.”

“No can do, detective,” she sang, as she picked up Sam’s old leather jacket.

“Deanna. I don’t want to have to say this… But if I see you leaving here, I _will_ tell Bobby about where you’re going.”

“You wouldn’t.”

“I mean it, Deanna. I want you… safe. Please.”

She felt her lip curl. “Great. Cop turned detective turned jailor.” She sat down on her bed, and stared up at him with contempt in her eyes. “Whatever will he think of next?”

*


	7. Not a Machine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Sam moves out.

If Deanna was honest, she was relieved to be robbed of her ability to get involved in the train wreck this sounded like it was turning into. But when had she ever been honest with herself? It went against everything that she was not to try and leave to warn the others – to get Bela out of there. The others, she could forgive herself for. But Bela? Bela and Deanna had always had each other’s backs, whatever was going on between them personally, and this felt like almost as unimaginable a betrayal as abandoning Sam would feel.

But Castiel really hadn’t given her any other option but to sit there and wait and do nothing.

When she’d finished texting them all, Cas, from the chair at her desk, turned and asked her, “What do you think they’ll think when they find out you knew about the raid before it happened?”

“Not the important part here, Columbo.”

She smirked as she watched him wince at the name.

“I should… sell this coat or something.”

“No – don’t.” He looked over at her, frowning quizzically as she shrugged. “It suits you.”

She could see from his eyes that he _almost_ wanted to smile at her, but was nervous to, in case she was laughing at him. “Deanna, I know some of the cops on that team, they’ll try their best to be gentle…”

“That’s not the part that matters.” She sighed. “A lot of the girls down there? They’re… they’re like me. They’ve either already been through the system or lived their life afraid it’s gonna get them eventually.” She stared at her knees. “I should be there.”

“Your…” She could hear him struggling for the right word. “…ex. Is she there?”

So someone had told him about Bela. “Yeah, she should be.”

“And you still love her?”

Deanna wrinkled her nose. “I never thought about it like _that_... We’re never bought into that melodrama… Nah, it’s just… we’ve always looked out for each other.” She laughed slightly. “It doesn’t matter about how we treat each other, what’s going on… we made each other family when we didn’t have a lot of that around.” She smiled up at him, a little bitterly. “But _love_? I don’t know if I’ve ever… had that. What about you, I guess you loved your wife, right?”

His blue eyes flicked up, meeting hers. There was a lot of sadness there, but also… shame, so deep-rooted Deanna would have tried to backtrack and apologise if it weren’t for the fact that she was still so mad at him. So now he was suffering too? Awesome.

“I guess so,” he said eventually, looking away again.

Deanna decided she wasn’t done watching him squirm. “What was she like? What was her name?”

Cas sighed and looked back at her, his lip starting to twitch in anger. “Her name was Daphne. And she was a very…” He sighed again. “Giving sort of person. She came from a very Christian background.”

“So what was it that made you, Castiel, realise that you were in love with this woman?” Deanna asked, leaning forwards towards him off the bed. “Was it the way she did her hair, or the way she always made your sandwiches just right? Or the way she laughed at your terrible jokes and sucked you off until you came so hard that-”

He stood up, eyes flaming and coat swishing around his legs.  “Enough.”

“What, so you can dish out sanctions and quiz me on every little thing, but you can’t even talk about how you feel about a woman who’s been dead for years? Dude, people die in accidents all the fucking time – you’re stopping me from going to help people now – and that’s preventable!”

She was standing up in front of him now, staring up into those unbelievable eyes again, standing close enough to hear the words he was speaking so softly. “Her death was preventable.”

She raised her eyebrows. “Didn’t she die in a car accident? Unless you were driving, you must have some properly fucked up complex there…”

“Daphne’s death was preventable because it wasn’t an accident.”

“Someone had it out for you and went for your wife…?”

“Nothing so _melodramatic,_ no.” He stared her down so coldly that she almost squirmed under his gaze. “She was… upset with me…” Deanna closed her eyes briefly, feeling the shame of pushing him to this wash over her. “…It’s impossible to be sure of whether she drove the car off the road purposefully. But I know. She’d always been a careful driver.”

“Cas…” She didn’t have any words for this. She’d never been any good at feelings-shit. And years locked away had trained her out of apologies a long time ago. And he just continued to stare, entirely now without shame or doubt. This, for him, was fact, and he dared her to challenge him, to say _anything._

“I wanna take a walk,” she said eventually, afraid she sounded like a scared little girl now.

“Fine, I’ll go with you.”

“Alone.”

“No.”

She let out a growl of frustration and turned back to sit on her bed, fists clenched around her covers to stop herself hitting something.

“You’d be too late, now.”

She wasn’t going to cry, and she _wasn’t going to cry in front of this guy._ Deanna Winchester didn’t, as a rule, cry. When she risked a glance up, she saw that he was back in his seat and looking as though he was thinking about coming over and trying to comfort her, but was, rightfully, afraid of the sort of reaction that would get for it.

“I suppose if I’m already too late… then you could just leave me alone…”

He stood up again. “I guess I can.” It hurt, again, more than it should, when the look of concern in his eyes was so rapidly replaced by this business-like coldness. “As you keep saying, Deanna, this is your life. If you want to throw it away again, it’s not my place to stop you.”

“What exactly is _again_ supposed to mean?” she asked, getting to her feet as he started walking away from her. “Goodnight, Deanna,” he told her, and shut the door behind him.

*

In his dream that night, _Daphne was there in the bed beside him, stroking a hand down his chest just like she always used to, as she stared at him like she was terrified he was about to disappear out of her grasp forever. “Emmanuel… you knew, you always knew, and you didn’t care.”_

_“I cared, I did-”_

_“No you cared, but only for yourself, only for what it would do to you if I died, and you’d stopped caring about that too, by the end.” She rolled out of bed and smiled at him, her eyes strangely frenzied for the calm on her face. “You can’t lie to me, not here. The first thing you felt when you heard the news was relief.”_

_“That’s not right-”_

_“But it is the truth. We were killing each other at the end, and you knew that. You got out, and I just didn’t make it.” She gave him that smile again, so familiar, and still able to chill his blood. “You show more concern for the wellbeing of a thief and a slut that you don’t even know than you ever did for your wife.”_

_He was unable to answer as she turned away from him and picked up something on the dressing table. As she faced him once more he saw that it was a gun, the same sort of gun he’d carried as a cop, and that her face was no longer Daphne’s.  No, now it was Deanna who looked down at him, pointing the gun at him, and as she pulled the trigger he heard her say, “Nobody likes a liar, detective.”_

_As he felt the bullet tear its way through his flesh towards his heart,_ Cas arrived back into consciousness with a heaving breath, before being immediately forced to take another long draw for air when he saw the green eyes staring down at him.

“Bad dream, detective?”

“How… how did you get in here?”

Deanna grinned and sat down on the bed beside him. “You left your door unlocked, genius. You should start learning not to do that around here.”                                                                                                             

Cas started sitting up, thanking God or whoever might be listening that he hadn’t decided to sleep naked the night before, but was wearing a pair of shorts an old t-shirt instead. As he looked over warily at Deanna, the dream still reverberating through his head, she squirmed and looked away from him. “Look, man, I just wanted to say I’m sorry for what I put you through last night – it’s just, you know, my friends were – are – in trouble and you were the only one around to take it out on. And I… I don’t think I ever really thanked you for what you did… so yeah, thanks.”

“Anytime,” he told her, meaning it. It was… sad, seeing how confused and angry she became when someone was doing something just for her. She didn’t seem to think she deserved such concern.

She coughed, apparently grateful that he wasn’t trying to continue the topic. “So… yeah, I was actually coming down to try and get a favour out of you…”

“Oh?”

“Yeah – I wouldn’t ask for me, alright?” She pushed out her upper lip defensively, as Cas thought to himself that of course she wouldn’t. “It’s for Sam, or I wouldn’t ask. So look, are you busy today? Do you need to be in the office?”

Well, he should be, but Anna probably wouldn’t mind, since it was relevant for his ‘case’.

“No, not really. Is this about Sam moving out?”

“Yeah – it’s just that Ash was supposed to be around today to help out as an extra moving guy but he can’t make it – you free to help shift some boxes? Bobby would be helping, but you know about his bad back I guess, and Ellen’s working and Jo’s at an interview…”

“I’d be happy to help, Deanna.”

“Awesome,” she sighed, standing up. “Alright I think we’re getting the car packed up in about half an hour, alright?”

“Alright.”

As she left the room, Cas lay his head back on his pillow for a few minutes. Life certainly hadn’t been dull for him since he’d started on this case. Maybe today he might actually get a chance to talk to Sam about how he felt about the Devases, justifying Cas’ extended time out of the office…

But in the end he never managed to seize the opportunity – Sam was far too full of frenzied excitement, and Deanna was, as usual, demanding a disproportionate amount of Cas’ attention. Only he wasn’t sure how much of it was Deanna trying to take her mind off the fact of what they were doing, and how much of it was just Deanna genuinely enjoying having someone see her car who hadn’t already.

“…I mean, I’m gonna still be paying this thing off when Bobby’s in his grave – he’s not even getting all his money back. But I mean, man, she is fucking worth it. Just listen to that engine – you ever heard anything so sweet in your whole life?”

At this point in his sister’s narrative, Sam looked back at Cas from his ‘shotgun’ space in the front and smiled. “I’m afraid this is about all we’ll be getting out of her this whole ride. Luckily I’m not staying far from here.”

Deanna took one hand off the wheel for a moment to punch him. “Just because you’ve shot down all your chances by renting a pricey flat to ever own such a classic beauty, doesn’t mean everyone’s such a freak, Sam.”

“Yeah, and some people who live in a city remember about public transport links and try doing their bit not to destroy the environment.”

She groaned dramatically as she pulled them round a corner so quickly that Cas felt several cardboard boxes slide down the seats to stop up against his ribs.

“ _Please_ , don’t go all hippy on me again, Sammy.”

“It’s not ‘going hippy’ – it’s just the only practical way to think about saving the planet…”

As Cas listened to the two of them bicker in front of them, Cas smiled, glad to hear Deanna seemed recovered, or at least enough to not want to let her brother see her in pain. Although he couldn’t help… disapprove, almost, of the parental tone the love Deanna had for her brother sometimes seemed to take, their relationship was one he found fascinating, and he genuinely enjoyed watching them with each other. The jibes and jokes arose so naturally between them, and yet he knew, from speaking to them individually, how deeply their past, and Deanna’s choice, had affected them both. But talking together, they seemed determined not to mention it, or let it colour their conversation, or relationship. If anything, the childish way they acted around each other seemed to be their way of trying to make up for lost time. Sam had been just eight, Cas remembered, when they’d been split up. Eight years old and already robbed of parents and sister, and betrayed in the worst possible way by the only remaining family member to show interest in him. He was lucky that the surrogate family he’d been placed with had been so good for him – he could so easily not have been so lucky.

That had to weigh on him so heavily, Cas thought again, to know that while he’d spent his older childhood with basically everything provided for him, his sister had been forced to go through a much harder life, and on his behalf. If he even had an inkling of what she was continuing to put herself through now…

Sam’s new apartment block wasn’t quite so outwardly appealing as the one he’d just left, however Cas could understand the appeal for the student. It was relatively short walk away from the university and it seemed surrounded by a very young neighbourhood. Cas hadn’t lived far from here when he had Balthazar had shared a flat back in his own college days…

Deanna nudged him lightly with the box she was carrying and smiled. “You got a little dreamy eyed there, dude. Y’alright?”

Cas nodded and smiled at her and they walked into the building. Sam was staying, rather unhelpfully on the top floor of his building and so  the trips up and downstairs were going to be tiring. Luckily his new roommates seemed happy enough to help out. Andy, who Cas had already met, was definitely the friendliest, although Jake also seemed like a nice guy, and certainly his height and strength were appreciated when they were carrying up boxes full of kitchen equipment. Ava seemed to keep her distance a little more than the other two, though she too seemed friendly, and Cas suspected that she was quite comfortable in charge as the apartment’s only female.

When coming up the stairs with a last box full of Sam’s clothes, Cas saw her at the top of the stairs, chatting with Jake. “…So that’s the sister then… Weird, right?”

“She looked pretty cute for a hardened criminal, Ava.”

Ava snorted, and Cas tried to stay very still. This could be awkward if they saw him. “You would say that. I’m just saying, it’s good for Sam he’s finally getting away from her.”

Jake scratched his head absently. “I dunno, Ava, she’s the only family Sam’s got.”

“Exactly. We all gotta fly the nest sometime. And Sam’s flight’s been a loooong time coming. That sister of his has always had a creepy sort of hold on him.”

“I dunno if I’d say creepy…” Jake started disputing as they finally left the stairwell and went back through into the apartment. Below them, Cas breathed a sigh of relief, and turned when he heard someone walk by him. Deanna.

“How long were you standing there?”

She looked back at him, face as stony as a catwalk model’s. “Long enough. You good to get out of here soon?”

“Yeah… yeah of course.”

They managed to extricate themselves from the students fairly quickly after that, though Sam seemed a little hurt and confused that Deanna was so keen to leave him again. ‘Creepy,’ Ava had called their relationship. Cas wouldn’t have said that, not at all. They hadn’t had a lot to cling onto through their lives, not a lot of constants either. It was natural, their reluctance to leave one another, although perhaps it was best for both of them that it had come about eventually. Sam at least seemed happy here. And Deanna… Deanna was strong, Cas thought again to himself as he sat next to her in the front seat of her beloved Impala.

“So not all of Sam’s new roommates are such lovely people then,” Cas commented eventually, earning a wry smile from Deanna. “Nah, they don’t seem too bad. From all they’ve probably heard about me, creepy criminal’s not exactly the worst I was expecting to hear.”

“But it’s lies.”

She smirked. “Dude. You know where you were stopping me from going last night, right? I was about to go get myself arrested on a bajillion counts of theft and freakiness.”

Cas shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “I wouldn’t say that made you _creepy._ ”

“But it doesn’t give me any kind of moral podium to pose on. I’m really not…” She choked up slightly as she continued to stare on intently at the road. “I’m not a good person, Cas.”

For a moment he couldn’t think of anything to say, he simply stared at her, at the tears refusing to fall from her lovely green eyes, at the way she furiously tucked her hair back behind her ears. Then he shrugged. “I used to want to go and be a cop to go and fight the ‘bad guys’. I left the force when I realised that there weren’t any, not in the way I wanted there to be. People are always so much more messy than you think they’re going to be. And nobody’s anything as simple as a ‘good person’”.

For his efforts, Cas got a faint smile as a reply, but neither of them spoke the rest of the way home, and the car felt empty now with only two.

Charlie was in manning the front desk when they re-entered the building, and seemed to be involved in a highly spirited discussion with Bobby about finances. As Cas went over to them to find out what it was they were talking about, Deanna muttered something about feeding the dog and left them to walk upstairs.

“…I can’t say it another way Bobby, _no_ trail. Nothing. And I’m good at this.”

“Balls. I hate not knowing something like this,” Bobby growled, taking off his cap in frustration. “Cas! How did the move go?”

“Sam seems to have settled in fine.”

“How’s Deanna doing?” Charlie asked. “What?” She added when they both gave her a look. “C’mon, everyone knew this was going to screw her up in every which way. Last time I saw her with a look on her face like that? We were sitting down to watch the Red Wedding.”

Cas frowned. “She’s fine. What is it you’ve been trying to chase, Charlie?”

“Oh, money.” She rolled her eyes. “I’m guessing you heard about that crazy anonymous tip of $500,000 we got in last night? I’m trying to track the donor down, but, so far, no bite.”

Cas looked up at Bobby. “You know, Anna’s made financial decoding something of a speciality in recent years. If I asked her to…”

Bobby nodded. “That’d be great Cas. Hell, it’s more outta curiosity than anything else, but it’s good to know who your friends are, y’know? And to be honest I don’t trust anyone that generous so outta the blue.”

Cas smiled. Bobby really hadn’t changed. Being suspicious of everyone had been what had made him such a great cop. “I’ll ask her. Now, at the moment I’ll just go up and see how Deanna is.”

“Hey, Cas,” Bobby added as Cas started moving on up the stairs. “Thanks for being here for her. She’s not normally so great at… letting people get close.”

Cas nodded, feeling that now-familiar sensation of guilt clutch around his heart. He would have to tell them all eventually – they would all have to find out why he was here in the first place, surely. And how would they look at him, and his unexpected ‘closeness’ to Deanna then?

He knocked briefly on Deanna’s door before walking on in, remembering that no one around here seemed to have much use for locks. Deanna was sitting on her bed, her hands buried in the neck-fur of Sam’s dog, Khan, Cas remembered, and her head meeting his nose. The two of them were sitting very still, finding solidarity in their shared abandonment, perhaps.

“Deanna?”

She didn’t look up.

“Are you alright?”

“M’fine.”

He walked over to stand in front of her, then knelt down beside the dog, who, with one last look at his new owner, turned away and trotted into the kitchen. Deanna smiled faintly. “He’s made himself at home pretty fast around here.”

“It’s a homely sort of place.”

She smiled down at him where he was still perched on the floor. “Cas, you know I’m fine, right? You don’t need to sit here with me like I’m about to have a breakdown.”

Cas shrugged. “I don’t think you’re about to have a breakdown, Deanna. But everyone needs looked after a little when they’ve been having a bad day. And, partly thanks to me, you’ve not been having such a good few days.”

“Bad days happen. Life’s a bitch like that. You move past them, or you crumble. And I’m not crumbling yet.”

Cas placed a hand on her knee. “You’re not a machine, Deanna.”

She looked down at him, with eyes that sadly didn’t trust him. She shouldn’t, of course. He was only here in the first place because… No, he corrected himself. He was here for her, for this fascinating and beautiful and deeply troubled woman who couldn’t admit that she would ever need someone to lean on.

In the end, he didn’t think very much about what he did next. It was stupid, and there was no going back from it, he knew that. What had happened before, when they’d been strangers getting drunk together, that had been different. That had been justifiable, excusable, forgettable. This was an active decision on his part, in broad daylight, and… he knew he should stop himself, he knew that, but he just... couldn’t quite bring himself to.

He started simply by tucking the stray strands of her hair back behind her ears, and the confusion she looked back at him with just made her look so painfully _young._ But then he leant up, still holding one hand at her head, placing his other on the bed to push himself up towards her. And then he pressed his lips to hers.

*

It wasn’t like the last time. The hazy blur and smell and taste of alcohol was gone now - she was painfully sober, and in the light of her room she could see everything about him, she noticed every small detail. And he had changed. He wasn’t just the hapless handsome near-stranger she’d decided she wanted some fun from. This time she knew him – she knew something about what he looked like in his darker moments, and he’d seen her in hers, and he hadn’t turned away – he’d stuck with her through it. He’d stuck there with her even when he knew just how messed up she was because he _cared._

It was fucking terrifying.

For the first time in a long time, Deanna felt herself relinquish some of the control she usually kept such tight reigns on, and _relaxed,_ and even felt a small tear start to roll down her cheek. Cas noticed, of course he noticed, and when he drew back, taking his tongue from her mouth, he kissed her cheek, so gently Deanna felt like really crying now. Crying and telling him she wasn’t worth any of this attention. As he moved to sit beside her on the bed, he placed one hand on her waist, and when he used it to lightly push her backwards she didn’t resist. She hated this, usually, she reminded herself sharply as for a moment she pulled away from his kiss. She hated being so… being like clay in someone’s hands, like that fucking Swayze movie.

Sensing her uncertainty, Cas paused and lay back from her, staring at her, looking disappointed, but like… like she was _important,_ and somehow letting her know that he would wait as long as she needed until he touched her again. They were crazily communicative, those big, blue eyes of his. And fuck everything, she didn’t need to make him wait on her. She wanted this, she wanted him, and she was a big girl who could think over consequences and circumstances later.

So she curled her fingers around the collar of his coat, and gripped on tightly as she smiled at him. “You think you could maybe just… kiss me again like that?”

His reply was, happily, the only answer she’d wanted from him.

His chapped lips moved everywhere, always lightly over her skin, moving up from her lips to nibble playfully at the tip of her nose – and he did it so childishly that she almost started laughing. And then when he kissed at her neck, so open-mouthed that she felt as though he was trying to swallow her, it was all she could do not to giggle and flail as though he was tickling her. She tried to start undoing the buttons on her old shirt, but he put a hand over hers, stopping her. “Let me,” he told her, “let me take care of you, Dean.”

She offered no resistance when he guided her arms up above her head and slowly pulled off her shirt and tee, and pulled off his own coat, kneeling as he did so. He almost looked like some kind of bird, or a bat, coming down on her when he kissed her again between her collarbones, lingering this time. “I don’t suppose,” he started, in that ridiculous caveman voice of his, “you need me to tell me how beautiful you are?”

She hit him on the back. “Don’t be a sap.”

“I mean it,” he told her, eyes flicking open wide to meet hers. “If I had any of the right words, I’d write sonnets, or songs, to tell everyone about how wonderful you look, how wonderful you _are.”_

“Would the songs involve a kickass guitar solo?”

“Oh definitely not,” he said gravely, “this could only involve the cheesiest, corniest sort of music. If anyone took me seriously, then I might have to compete to spend any time with you.”

She narrowed her eyes at him. “You smooth sonofabitch.”

“We’ll see. I never was any good at bra straps,” he added in explanation when she raised her eyebrows at him.

Trying not to laugh, she rolled closer to him, on to her side. “First test then, D.I. Smooth.”

And he really didn’t do so badly, on taking up that particular challenge. His hands weren’t even cold, it was so easy just to relax into them, towards him, her mouth gravitating back to his once more. While his hands slid down her back… He was rolling her jeans down her legs now, _God,_ and her underwear with them, sliding himself, still basically fully clothed, off of the bed, where he started fiddling with her bootlaces, and gently took them off too. A moment later she was splayed out on the bed, entirely naked in front of him. For a second she wanted to stop him, stop everything – she felt far too vulnerable, far too exposed, and she was… well, almost enjoying this too much, too soon. Hearing the depth of her breathing, he looked up at her from where he knelt at her knees, and raised his eyebrows, a silent question of whether or not to continue.

A loud part of her was still trying to scream that she didn’t deserve him here with her, caring for her like this. She didn’t deserve anyone right now, not when she was being such a selfish bitch over Sammy, or when she’d abandoned Bela and the rest of them so easily, and she certainly didn’t deserve _him_ , who she kept on using horribly and pushing away again. She should be doing something for him…

Cas slowly started to splay her legs. “Dean… Let me… let me give you something. Just for now. Please.”

It was the ‘please’ that sent her head falling back onto the bed in submission, as his mouth tenderly started kissing her again.

And _goddamit,_ the guy knew how to use his tongue, but his first taste inside of her felt almost _chaste._ But then he started to use his fingers to widen her, to open her up for him, and when he went in licking again…

“ _Fuck_ , Cas.”

“I’m getting to that.”

She almost laughed before he went in again and all she was able to do for a moment was gasp. The phrase, _eat her out,_ had never seemed so damn appropriate, she thought as she looked down at him, at the messy mop of dark sexhair, moving between her legs. Unable to stop herself, she curled one hand’s fingers through his hair, and moved with him, as she felt herself grow closer and closer to climaxing… it was too fast, it was too fast… And she cared far too much…

It was that last though that sent her moaning out his name as her head was forced back again with the force of the orgasm ripped through her.

...and she got so damn _pathetic_ when someone had her all sated like this, like a happy fucking cat who’d just ended up with all the cream. She wanted to slap herself… but she also just wanted to let him curl up against her, and hold her, and make her feel all of the sappy shit like warm and safe and _loved._ For a long while all they did was lie there, legs entwined, Cas still wearing most of his clothes as her breathing started to slow down to a normal pace again.

He started nuzzling at her ear. “Was that… was that alright?”

Smiling lazily, she turned her head around slightly. “What’s with the past tense, detective? Is that all you got for me?” She brought her arm back behind her back and groped for his cock, gone hard and tight inside his pants. “Because I’m not so sure I’m finished with you.” She licked her lips, and hoped he could see her raise her eyebrows. “…Big boy…”

When he pulled her towards him this time, he was anything but gentle and slow.

*

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope everyone reading's liking it all so far! do feel free to say whatever it is you (don't)like, i really do love getting any feedback at all :D


	8. Night Prowler

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After a little longer ignoring the fact, Deanna and Cas remember they have careers, of sorts, to attend to.

It was the same dream as always, _the lunch hall crammed full of all the familiar young faces, suspicious and hardened and happy and always with the vanity and the fucking insecurities that couldn’t belong to anyone but a bunch of hurt and angry teenage girls… and Deanna was there, next to Bela – they were always sticking close – and Bela was trying to be snarky with Abbadon again… Only in the dream it didn’t sound like something Bela would say, it sounded more of a Sam sort of comment… and Bela was a scrawny sort of kid… And Deanna really only wanted to help her out, to save her, like she’d saved Sammy… but Abbadon wasn’t the destroying demon she claimed to be… and she went down easily enough… and there was blood in her red hair… and Deanna wanted to stop hitting her, to stop hurting her, she did… And the girls were shouting her on, and Bela was growling at her to stop, to wake up…_

“Wake up, Deanna! Deanna! Dean _please._ ”

Cas was shaking her awake, but her legs continued to flail and her chest to heave, drawing for desperate breaths, for another few moments. She wasn’t fifteen anymore. She was twenty-seven. She was in her own bed. Just her and an attractive naked man, with not a teenage girl in sight.

“Did I… did I hit you?”

His face slid into a smile of relief, and his grip on her shoulder loosened slightly. “Not badly, no.”

“Awesome,” she breathed, sitting up. “Sorry about… that. Must have dozed off at some point.”

“You were asleep for half an hour, maybe.” He narrowed his eyes at her in that cute little way he had. “Do you want to talk about what was upsetting you?”

She snorted, and raised her eyebrows. “No. What are you my shrink?”

“I just wondered if it might help…”

She rolled her eyes, but she felt a little buzz of warmth inside her that was becoming jarringly familiar. He was concerned for her. “Look, it was just a prison flashback. This…” She sighed, knowing now she was going to end up explaining the whole story. “There was this girl, she was a little older than me, and she’d been kinda picking on Bela for a while. Her name was Abigail, or Abbie or something like that, but she’d started calling herself _Abbadon,_ to sound all mighty and cool.” Deanna nodded to herself, remembering. “If there was one girl the rest of us were all kind of afraid of? It was her. I can’t remember what she was in there for but it must have been something pretty damn serious. Anyway she started knocking Bela about a bit this one time… and the two of us, we’d basically stuck with each other since I’d got there. I was pretty tall for my age, pretty strong too, and she always had a comeback ready if someone insulted us. And I was in for attempted murder, she was there for the real deal.” Cas’ eyes widened, just slightly.

“…So yeah. Mostly nobody messed with us.”

“But then this girl started hurting Bela.”

Deanna swallowed. She’d never talked about this before. Her family would have thought less of her. If she’d told them at the time they might have stopped visiting so often. And she’d never had a ‘pillow talk’ moment because she never normally spent any time in bed with someone. But here Cas was, caring and struggling with his own shit.

“She did. And I couldn’t let her. So I… I jumped at her. And I kept hitting her down. I knew I didn’t need to keep hitting her, but I was…” She tried to steady her voice. “I was just so _angry_ at her, and at _everything_ , and I’d never let it out until then… and it just felt so good. I _liked_ it.” She took a deep breath and didn’t look up at him. “They needed to get the medic to stitch her up. And after that nobody called her Abbadon again unless they were laughing at her. And I was the new king of the ring.”

Cas laid a hand on her arm. “Deanna, you were in an extreme situation. And you did what you did for the right reasons.”

“That’s not good enough,” she growled, looking back at him. “She found a way to kill herself about six weeks after that. So yeah. This isn’t something that’s fixable.”

“The way you’re feeling might be. There is no reason you still need to blame yourself for something that was someone else’s choice.”

“Well look who’s talking.”

He blinked, slowly. “Perhaps we should both start trying to forgive ourselves,” he said eventually, though she wasn’t sure how much she believed that he believed in what he was saying. Leaning towards him, she kissed him, her teeth lingering over his bottom lip. “I don’t need solving, detective. Anyway, nothing’s bothering me that I can do anything about. Not now. It all happened a long time ago now.”

He nodded, staring into her. “Sometimes the things that happened a long time ago still leave wounds.”

“…but we shouldn’t be talking shitty _wounds_. I wanna have morning sex.”

Cas was startled into a smile. “Deanna, it’s six in the evening.”

“I slept. Sorta. So it’s morning,” she declared, putting an arm over his shoulder, her hips begging him to pull her in towards him as she started pulling herself under the covers again. She managed to make him moan a little as she started tugging at his nipples with her teeth.

“But we… we should talk about this… if… you’re… if you’re still upset…”

She popped her head out of the covers, leaning her chin against his chest. “Do I look upset to you, detective?”

“Well…”

“Well do I _seem_ upset?” she tried again more forcefully as she slowly started to wrap her fingers around his cock. “Because I _feel_ more like a woman being denied her evening-morning sex.”

Roughly now, he quickly wound his arms around her back and pulled her lips up to his, but she kept her hands exactly where she wanted them to stay. And… sure, it was dinner time, but this was the first real morning sex she’d had in a while. So screw foreplay. Putting one hand on his shoulder she lifted herself up around him, and threw her thigh around his hips, trapping him as his fingers continued to play with her long hair. This was one of those days she was glad she’d kept it long. Because at the moment he was looking up at her like… She wasn’t sure she wanted to think about that, about how exactly he was looking at her. Because right now he looked like an idiot in love.

A very sexy idiot though, with that mussed up hair of his splayed out on the pillow like that.

Putting both hands back around his cock, Deanna tensed her stomach muscles and leaned back in towards Cas’ face. “The upset woman would like you inside of her now. Please.”

Taking the almost laugh he gave her as a go ahead, Deanna leaned back, and sighed in mock concern. “Oh honey, you’re so _stiff_ – do you need me to help you with that?” And she drew him inside of her, with only a small gasp, and for a second she had to close her eyes. Everything just felt so… right, at the moment. And now she was riding a beautiful man with the stamina of a god. And all so hot and hard and _huge_ inside of her.

“More?”

“ _Please_ ,” she breathed back with a smile, the word escaping before she could stop it. She hated to beg during sex. But then, she wasn’t exactly at his mercy here, she thought, grinning, as they recovered their quick, frantic rhythm, as she started to watch his whole lovely form go rigid beneath her, his hips jerking upwards to meet hers. She came with a low cry and felt her body slump down towards his. And though she felt like she was literally seeing stars now, she continued moving for him, her hands bordering his beautiful face as she felt him rise up towards his own climax, and when he finally came she collapsed entirely, sealing him inside of her.

She was still breathing heavily when she lay down beside him, separated eventually, and still pleasantly finding that he wanted to hold her tight against him. It was… a little strange, but it was very sweet.

“Deanna… We didn’t…”

“I’m on the pill – I figured you seemed clean,” she muttered forcefully as she planted another kiss on his chest. “So… Wanna get some food together? I’m hungry.”

Apparently listening out for any mention of food, Khan re-entered the room after poking his nose around the door, a little sheepishly. For a moment, Deanna just collapsed against Cas, laughing at the dog’s expression, trying not to remember about what his presence meant. But, grinning, she eventually got herself up out of the bed, the dog following her a little dopily, and moved over to the kitchen. After she got the dog some of the food Sam had left for her, she turned on the radio, and was pleased to hear ACDC playing loud when she did.

“…She was the best damn woman that I, EVER seen,” she sang, holding her arms out in invitation for Cas to come and join her. Because fuck it. If she was going to dance naked around her own kitchen whilst trying to make pasta, she wasn’t going to do with only Sam’s dumb dog for company. Proving himself far more obedient than the mutt, Cas, sure enough, came up and joined her, and they started dancing around the kitchen together, while trying to avoid tripping over the dog, or letting the pasta boil over. As the song ended, Deanna let Cas dip her low down near the flow, as she half-heartedly attempted to air-guitar.

“Have I told you yet this not-morning how beautiful you are?” he whispered into her ear as he drew her back up to her feet. She put on a puzzled face. “Well, no, detective, not _this_ morning-evening you haven’t…”

But before he could tell her anything in answer, they heard the radio report begin again, stating some cold statistic of an earthquake that had gone on somewhere a long way away. And then it started to move on…

_“…And a police raid on a house in Kansas city may have led to the cops working on the exposure of a dangerous ring of thieves…”_

“Shit.”

“… _So far little information regarding the incident has been released, however, we can confirm the names of several of the individuals brought in for questioning last night – a Cassie Robinson, and a Bela Talbot…”_

“No, nonononono…” Deanna let go of Cas’ hands and ran over to press her ear to the radio, but it was already moving on to another story. Fighting the urge to pick up the radio and hurl it across the room, Deanna went back to the bed and started throwing cushions around. But it didn’t help her feel any better. Bela was in trouble and Deanna could have saved her from it.

Yet another sin no amount of excellent sex or soothing touches on her hair were ever going to wipe away.

*

She was flinching at his touch now. Did she blame him, for the part he’d played in the arrest? “Deanna… you’ll be able to place bail, I’m sure…”

“They didn’t get Lilith. They didn’t get Alistair.”

“It didn’t say anything about them, no…” Cas started, hesistatingly.

“Lilith’s going to want a reschedule for last night. And I haven’t checked my phone in hours.” Deanna stood up again and found her clothes where they’d left them lying on the floor. As she started aggressively putting them all on again, she looked at the cell she’d left in her jeans pocket. “Shit,” she muttered. “Yeah, Lilith wants to see us.”

Cas blinked. “Deanna, you can’t be considering going…”

“Why not? Cas this is still my only job. So I’m going to head along for it now. Nothing has changed here, detective.” She stared him down, almost daring him to say something about reporting her. Of course he wasn’t going to tell the police. Whether he was going to have to tell Naomi was a different issue…

“Will you at least tell me where you’re going?”

She narrowed her eyes, sticking her chin out fiercely. “Why?”

“Because I’m going to worry about you. I don’t trust Folter and he now has reason not to trust you.”

Her face softened, just slightly. “I’ll text you with wherever we end up, alright? But you’re not coming after me. I can look after myself.”

“I believe you. But if you go missing I’ll need to know where to start looking.”

Her lips quirked up at the edges, just slightly. “Better get some pants on first, detective,” she told him, with no sign of the same vulnerability in her voice, her face, and in moments she’d grabbed a bag and left the apartment, leaving Cas alone. She’d left like she was out on a quest for vengeance, and not just leaving for work. Like she was trying to prove something to herself, or to someone else, that just because she hadn’t been caught with Bela didn’t mean that she shouldn’t have been.

Khan poked his head around the kitchen door and trotted out to sit at Cas’ feet, and cocked his head, as though he was announcing himself ready to listen. A little tentatively, Cas started scratching his floppy ears thinking that Sam hadn’t been lying - he had kept his dog well trained.

“Should I follow her later?” he asked the listening dog. “Should I make sure she’s alright? She wouldn’t like that very much would she now?”

His companion’s only reply was a soft whine.

“Or should I call Naomi about all this? I haven’t actually told her anything yet… I’m not earning what she’s paying me at all, not yet. But I don’t know if I want her to know.” He frowned. “I’m not even sure what it is I know. Because I don’t even know for certain what it is your new mistress does for a living… And she’d hardly tell me if I asked her, now would she?”

Khan rubbed his head up against Cas’ hand, and Cas obediently continued to scratch him, a little absently now, though. It was hard, thinking about whatever it was Deanna was really doing. It wasn’t legal, he was certain of that much. And the fact that she was working under a man known as Kansas City’s answer to Capone among those in the force, and had referred to ‘the girls’ she worked with… It did lead the mind to prostitution. But the other night, Deanna had told him that he was the first man she’d been with in a long while. And the radio had referred to them as a ‘ring of thieves.’

Cas slumped his shoulders. He really was a sorry excuse for a detective of any sort. He should try talking to Anna… but he needed to talk to someone about this _now._ He just needed someone to tell him what to do next…

After he got changed, he took out his mobile. It wasn’t exactly a conscious decision to call Naomi, but suddenly he was listening to her dialling tone. And a few moments later the clipped sound of her voice was chirping at him.

“Castiel! I hadn’t heard anything, I was beginning to grow concerned.”

“No need for concern, Naomi. I’m… I’m just checking in.”

_Was that what he was doing?_

“So have you been able to talk with my niece and nephew yet?”

_A few more things than just talk…_

“Uh, yes. I’m afraid neither of them have a terribly favourable view of your family, or business. Having never met any of you before this is perhaps understandable.” There was only a slight tint of reproach in his voice.

“Perhaps, yes. So tell me, Castiel, what is it they do for a living?”

“Well Sam is studying law.”

“He must be very smart.”

“He is. His sister’s very proud.”

“And Deanna, what does she do?”

Khan looked up at Cas from his spot on the floor with a gloomy expression.

“…I’m not entirely certain, yet. Although I know that she did just leave for work now.”

“Is there any way that you can follow her?”

Cas wanted to say something about it being unethical, but then this was what he’d been hired for in the first place.

And hadn’t this been what he’d called to hear, really?

“Possibly.”

“Make sure you do,” she said, a little breathily, as though the whole situation was one she was barely able to repress excitement for. Not for the first time, Cas wondered what was really the motivations behind Naomi’s requests.

Khan started whining again when Cas hung up. Cas didn’t know much about dogs, he was probably asking for something. Everyone was always asking for something.

“I suppose I should go after her later then,” Cas told the dog, who pressed his face against his paws and whined again.

“The only question is, I suppose… why am I going? Who am I going for? To do my job? To protect Deanna? Or am I going for myself? To satisfy my own selfish curiosity?”

Cas frowned as the dog closed his eyes.

“Well you’ve not been very helpful. But thank you for listening to me.”

*

Deanna found herself starting to feel nostalgic for the shifts she’d done only last week, supporting Bela with not an Alistair in sight. Not holding the whole show on her own. It had been such a simple set-up, and she and Bela had been the dream-team. No one attracted a man like Bela, and certainly not the rich ones, or was able to hold his attention so completely. Unlike most of the other teams, they didn’t even need to pose as prostitutes half the time – because they were so damn good at what they did. Because where Bela was the pretty face, Deanna was almost always the one with the gun. That was what she’d really signed on for. She was _good_ at angry.

So usually of a night, a guy thought he’d be leaving with Bela for a blow or a quickie in an ally. Sometimes, depending on the scenario, he’d get something. But then if he wasn’t immediately happy with handing over the money they wanted, which was everything he had right then, and in his bank account too sometimes, then Deanna came over. With the camera phone she’d been using. And, if she’d show him the gun if he needed that extra push. If Bela really needed a night off, Deanna sometimes took over on the prostitute-posing. Because, Hell, she had a pair of breasts, and she wasn’t so bad looking herself, so they did alright there too.

Lilith had been running the game for years – she had them all trapped, really – they could make more money running solo, but she’d report them if they ever did. And mostly Deanna hadn’t minded – they made money fine, and there were perks to running in a large group. But Alistair’s operation was something of a step-up. Or it felt like it anyway. Instead of just picking up a random guy, they were now letting them do the picking up letting them bring them home. And instead of just backing Bela up, tonight Deanna was the one on the ‘front line’ as Lilith called it.

And Alistair was the back-up she’d had to text her location to from the bathroom when she’d got there. And then Cas, because… because she must be getting old and feeling sentimental.

It was Alistair with her tonight ransacking the house while she kept the guy busy as long as she was able to, because after last night he didn’t trust her yet. Fair enough really, she didn’t trust him either. And she _had_ known about the raid. Deanna wouldn’t have trusted herself if she were him, or any of them.

The man on the chair above her just kept on grunting like a pig as she thrust her mouth over his dick, again and again. And all the while she was training herself to keep going for just a little longer, just a little longer… And not to think of Cas… _don’t, don’t think of Cas, don’t try and compare…_

She’d been crazy, thinking for a few seconds back there that she might have had something there with the ex-cop. Not when _this_ was what she went out doing for money…

This guy probably deserved it of course, bringing a woman home as soon as his family were out of town. But it still wasn’t right, she knew that.

And dammit, it wasn’t right to put herself through either…

“Hey!” the guy grunted as she drew her face away from him, away from the hand  pressing into her hair.

Well this was an awesome time to develop a gag reflex.

With superhuman effort, Deanna forced her face into a simpering smile. “I thought I could rest my mouth a little for a moment and get my hands around you. You’re just too _big_ for me to handle all at once…” As she tailed off she felt like gagging all over again.

She placed her hands on the creep’s knees and licked her lips, drawing out a confused and reluctant smile from the man.

_How the fuck had Bela managed this so often?_

_Because she hates men and likes having power over people. You’ve always liked that about her._

Just as she was wracking her brains to try thinking of something else to say, to do, to avoid _it –_ and she really, really wasn’t so sure she could do that, not after leaving Cas like she had – she heard the light click of the front door downstairs. Finally.

“Alright, dude,” she started, slumping her shoulders and taking her hands off of his knees as she dropped her tone by a couple of octaves, “This is how it’s going, alright?” She pulled out her phone, which his piggy little eyes stared at like it was proof of alien life, and outstretched her arm. Then she pressed her lips to his dick again… and pressed the camera flash.                                

“These get left sent to your wife, and your boss if you try and report anything, ok?”

“Report what?” he asked, finally having found his tongue.

She shrugged, and stood up, picking up her bag. “Theft. Shit like that. A guy downstairs mighta taken out your tv. But hey, at least I’m not gonna have to ask you to pay me…”

“You bitch,” he muttered, but by the time he’d zipped his pants up and lunged towards her, she already had a gun aimed at his head.

“We done here?”

*

Cas had been outside the street  for about ten minutes when he started seeing the men arriving to fill a van, going in and out of the house quietly with what looked like half of its household goods.

Funny, but calling the cops onto this hadn’t even concerned him. He was barely able to connect the idea of ‘crime’ and ‘Deanna’ in his mind, illogical as it seemed, because she always seemed so _righteous_ , somehow, with her own fiercely individual code for things. But… Alistair Folter. He had her scared, didn’t he?

From his spot around the corner, Cas glared in particular at one silhouette watching over all the activity, smoking. He’d bet that was Folter. If only he could feel the burn of Cas’ eyes from where he stood over the road from him. Eventually the van drove off, without the man Cas took for Folter. A few minutes later, Deanna left the house. In the dark, Cas couldn’t see her either, but her way of walking was by now unmistakeable to him.

“…I thought I told you to stay in there as long as possible.”

Cas watched her shrug. “I stayed as long as I needed to.”

“I’m paying you, skank, to stay for longer.”

Cas felt like his heart was about to burst out of its ribcage as Alistair began backing Deanna into the house-wall, and he had to strain to listen to the man’s next words over the rising tempo of his own blood pumping.

“You knew about those cops, so you didn’t show. Saved your own ass. And now you won’t do as I say, you won’t do your job properly.” He leered in closer to her. “Do you need me to teach you, whore, how to do as I tell you?”

There was no thought behind what Cas did next. Everything was given over to a screaming need to _protectprotectprotect_ he charged forwards and knocked Alistair Folter down into the ground. As he heard Deanna start shouting at him, Cas kept on hitting at his unsuspecting victim, remembering what Deanna had told him hours ago about that girl, the one who had killed herself, that she’d become the ‘new king of the ring’…

There was blood on Cas’ knuckles when he let go of the unconscious man.

Which was when Deanna turned on him, green eyes flaring under the light of the streetlight. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”

*                       

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Really sorry this took so long! Just started on this new fic, and I've finally started studying, so there hasn't been a lot of time to come back to this... But hey, here it is eventually :)


End file.
